Quess Corp, India’s largest and a global leader in staffing solutions companies, today signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the International Organization for Migration (IOM), the United Nations migration agency, to launch a transformative initiative aimed at building a structured support ecosystem for workers seeking overseas employment, with a focus on enabling safe, compliant, and transparent migration pathways across India and Southeast Asia. This comes at a time when demand for Indian and Southeast Asian workforce in global markets is rising across sectors such as healthcare, technology, manufacturing, construction, logistics, and hospitality.
Over the last decade, Quess has enabled employment opportunities for more than 2.5 million individuals and currently manages a workforce of over 480,000 employees across multiple markets in Asia. With operations spanning India, the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia, Singapore, Sri Lanka, UAE, and other global markets, Quess brings deep cross-border workforce expertise and operational scale to support ethical labour mobility frameworks across Asia.
India is home to one of the world’s largest overseas communities, with over 35 million people of Indian origin living globally, including a significant and growing migrant workforce. Since its launch in 2014, the Government of India’s e-Migrate system has facilitated overseas employment for over five million Indian workers, primarily in low- and semi-skilled occupations. While India has a regulated recruitment framework, the Ministry of External Affairs has identified more than 3,000 unauthorised recruitment agents, underscoring the continued need for safe, orderly, and ethical migration pathways. By combining Quess Corp’s extensive workforce expertise with IOM’s global leadership in migration governance, this initiative seeks to mitigate such risks by replacing misinformation with verified, safe, and regular migration pathways.
At the core of this initiative is the launch of a Tele-Migrant Resource Centre (Tele-MRC), a national helpline offering multilingual guidance across the migration lifecycle, from documentation and legal pathways to grievance support. This will be complemented by physical walk-in centres across key regions. The initiative aims to reduce dependency on informal agents by providing verified, government-aligned information and support directly to workers.
Commenting on the development, Lohit Bhatia, Executive Director and Group CEO of Quess Corp, stated, “As global demand for skilled and semi-skilled talent continues to grow across sectors such as healthcare, manufacturing, logistics, hospitality, construction, and technology, it is critical that workforce mobility is supported by safe, ethical, and transparent systems. India and Southeast Asia are emerging as major talent hubs for the global economy, and protecting migrant workers through credible support mechanisms is both an economic and social imperative. Through this collaboration with IOM India, Quess aims to help build a trusted migration ecosystem that empowers workers with verified information, safeguards their rights, and enables dignified global mobility.”
Sanjay Awasthi, IOM’s Head of Office for India & Bhutan expressed, “With over 35 million people of Indian origin living globally and more than 480,000 Indians receiving emigration clearance in 2025 alone, the need for safe, orderly and regular migration pathways has never been more critical. At IOM, we believe that access to accurate information and trusted support systems is fundamental to protecting migrant workers and enabling informed decision-making. Our collaboration with Quess Corp represents an important step towards strengthening ethical recruitment practices with a focus on migrants’ rights and welfare in India by creating accessible, multilingual, and worker-centric support mechanisms that can guide migrants at every stage of their migration journey. Together, we aim to foster a migration ecosystem that is safer, more inclusive, and grounded in dignity and protection for all.”
Guided by IOM’s global experience and expertise related to migration management beyond providing a vital support channel, this initiative is designed to be a comprehensive ecosystem that professionalises the entire migration lifecycle while ensuring total inclusivity. By offering multilingual, accessible guidance, ranging from pre-departure counselling and contract verification to real-time grievance reporting and post-return reintegration, the platform will ensure that migrant workers, including those with limited access to digital platforms, are never left without a reliable support system. Insights from helpline interactions may also help identify emerging trends and inform future interventions in ensuring safe, orderly and regular migration.