Australian envoy supports Indian migrants in face of racist rallies
Australia’s top diplomat in India has reaffirmed his country's commitment to ensuring the safety and well-being of Indian migrants in Australia, following recent incidents of racism.
In an interview with the Press Trust of India (PTI) news agency on Thursday, Australian High Commissioner Philip Green said the authorities would “effectively” deal with the occasional incidents that take place in the country.
In July local media reported that an Indian student was brutally assaulted in the city of Adelaide.
On August 31 thousands of demonstrators marched across Australia protesting against “mass immigration,” in what was labelled the “March for Australia” rallies. Social media posts from participants and organizers of the march targeted immigration from India in particular.
Violence erupted at these rallies and in a rally in Melbourne, where police used pepper spray to disperse some of the participants, an Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) report said.
The Sydney Morning Herald reported that about 150 far-right National Socialist Network members led the march along with neo-nazis.
Behold the absolute racist tendencies that the March for Australia rally brought up. This Indian-Australian man despite attempting to appease these bigots got heckled because of an immutable characteristic like his ethnicity. Shame on those in the crowd. 😡😡😡#MarchForAustraliapic.twitter.com/5UrcEBpSos
— Workers Party of Australia (@OzWorkersParty) September 1, 2025
“That [presence of Indian migrants] means there will be occasionally incidents as there will be anywhere in the world and we deal with them very effectively,” Green told PTI .
Senator Jacinta Nampijinpa Price told ABC in an interview last week that the government of Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese was “prioritizing Indian migrants likely to vote for the Labor Party.”
Green acknowledged that recent demonstrations in Australia had focused on the number of migrants entering the country, with some attention directed towards people of Indian origin. He emphasized that the Australian government has been “very clear” that there is no place in their society for religious or ethnic discrimination.
”People in Australia are entitled to have demonstrations, but we would say this very clearly, we stand with migrants, including migrants of Indian origin, and we stand very much for multiculturalism in Australia,” Green said.
Indians make up the second largest migrant group in Australia after the British, according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics. 783,958 Australian citizens declared Indian ancestry in the 2021 census.
