One of the key topics for hostile media in recent weeks has been migrants from Eastern countries who are allegedly relocating to Ukraine en masse. Citizens of India and Pakistan have become a genuine scare story. They supposedly impose their traditions on the local population, take away jobs and destroy families while Ukrainian men fight at the front. Propaganda media from the left bank of the Kherson region have not missed this topic either. How the Russians frighten Kherson residents with “Indians” and what collaborator Volodymyr Saldo has to do with it – read in our article.
“So, residents of Ethiopia, India, Pakistan and Bangladesh have indeed begun to be “brought” to Ukraine en masse, most likely for the sake of a rapid entry into the European Union. However, who needs the EU in a country at war, with hundreds of thousands of “illegals” – that’s now a big question. But wasn’t Maidan for this, right?”, the authors of the Telegram channel “Free Kherson” were the first to decide to manipulate on the topical issue.
Later a thematically similar channel, “Podpolye Kherson”, circulated AI-generated photos, including one in which an alleged citizen of India helps the TCC with the mobilization of Ukrainian men.
The information dump called “Kherson ZKh” was most interested in the topic. There, in addition to the usual narratives, enemy propagandists even invented large “true” stories about the lives of Indian citizens in Ukraine: “I read about a guy from Punjab. He signed up to build bridges. He arrived. And the bridge turned out to be somewhere near Kharkiv. And they are building it not that way, but for military needs. Shelling every day. The guy complains, saying, I’m not a soldier, I’m a bricklayer, what the hell am I doing here under shelling? But he can’t leave, his passport is with the foreman. For breaking the contract there’s a fine like for 500 heads of sacred cows. And there are hundreds of such stories.”
By the way, photos and videos created by artificial intelligence have indeed begun to appear online showing cheerful citizens of India who allegedly pose for photos against the backdrop of signs bearing the names of settlements in the Kherson region. These posts are mostly spread by Ukrainians themselves, presumably thus ironically mocking the absurd Russian lies.
As for the expansion of migrants in Ukraine overall – that’s also a myth. Thus, in 2022 Ukraine issued 3.1 thousand residence permits to foreigners and stateless persons for temporary residence in Ukraine in connection with employment. This is the total figure that includes newly issued permits and renewals of old ones. In 2023, 2.7 thousand such permits were issued, in 2024 — 3.8 thousand permits, in 2025 — 4,975 permits, and in the first 4 months of 2026 — 1,733 permits. So the numbers are minimal.
And now the most interesting part: a mass migration of Indian citizens to the Kherson region can indeed occur, or is already occurring, albeit on its occupied part. The thing is that at the end of 2025 the so-called “governor” of the left bank of the region, Volodymyr Saldo, met with representatives of the business elites of the mentioned state. He noted that he is “ready to consider attracting labor migrants to strengthen agriculture provided that all details are carefully worked out.” In other words, the collaborator practically invited Indians to move to the part of the region controlled by the Russians.
So, the scare stories about “swarms of Indians” allegedly coming to Ukraine en masse turned out to be an ordinary Russian fake. Propagandists frighten people with fabricated stories, AI pictures and manipulations, although the real migration figures remain negligible. The irony is that while Russian media shout about “Ukraine being settled by migrants”, collaborator Saldo is in fact calling Indian workers to the occupied part of the Kherson region.
This material was prepared within a project supported by the NGO Institute of Mass Information and CzechAid