India Unhappy With Changes to US H1B Visa Program

India has recently complained to the World Trade Organization against the United States over changes to visas for skilled workers that Republican presidential candidates have targeted for elimination, according to a report in the UK's Financial Times.

The WTO revealed that India had requested consultations with the US over moves by Washington to raise fees for L1 and H1B working visas and also restrictions on the number of those visas awarded. The move is the first step in initiating a dispute at the WTO.

India's WTO complaint:

India's WTO complaint is over an increase in fees on H1B visas that the US imposed on companies with workforces comprised of more than 50 percent foreign workers. A provision included in last year's federal spending bill added a new $4,000 fee for each H1B, which India argues is discriminatory to the country under its trade agreement with the US.

Meanwhile, the annual gold rush in Silicon Valley to file applications for H1B visas has just begun, as the federal government began distributing some of the 85,000 H1B visas it is authorized to issue this fiscal  year, according to Vice News.

Indian Body Shops Infosys, TCS and Wipro Topped H1B Sponsor List in 2013

Why the Complaint?

Why is India complaining? There are two main reasons:

1. India's overall exports have suffered 18th consecutive monthly decline in February 2016, according to India's Economic Times. Exports from India amounted to US$264 billion in 2015,  down -12.4% since 2011 and down -16.9% from 2014 to 2015.

2. Most of India's IT exports to the United States are made up of wages of H1B workers brought to the United States by a handful of Indian body shops like Tata Consulting Services (TCS) and Infosys.  In 2014, 86% of the H1B visas for tech workers were granted to Indians, according to available data. Given India's heavy reliance on H1B workers for its IT exports earnings, it is natural that the Indian government gets very concerned whenever there's even a hint of the US possibly limiting H1B visas or making them more expensive.

Excluding the Indian H1B workers' pay,  such exports drop to about one-twentieth of the the amount reported by the Indian government as IT exports, according to a 2005 study by US General Accounting Office (GAO).

Cumulative Stock of H1B From 2007-2012: 775,957. Source: DICE

Indian Body Shops:

The Indian body shops like Cognizant, TCS and Infosys that rely on the H1B visa program in the US are "the shining star" of the Indian economy, and the country's largest export, according to an Indian-American professor Ron Hira who is a strong critic of the abuses of H1B program. By complaining, the Indian government and firms that rely on the program are trying to "build up a firewall so that no other reforms can come through and constrain the program in any way."

Indian Code Coolies:

H1B workers brought in by Indian body shops are described variously as "code coolies" or "H1B slaves". Some call them "indentured servants", like the ones from India who replaced slave labor after the British empire abolished slavery.

“’Indentured servants’ is a pretty accurate term because in many cases that’s exactly what’s going on,” said Phillip Griego of San Jose’s Phillip J. Griego and Associates. Over the years, Griego and his law partner, Robert Nuddleman have represented several H-1B workers in lawsuits against body shops.

Summary:

India has complained to the World Trade Organization about changes to the US H1B that mainly benefit India's body shops like Cognizant, Infosys and Tata at the expense of both US and Indian workers. US workers lose their jobs while Indian workers are exploited as wage slaves. India uses the wages of Indian H1B workers to inflate its IT export earning by as much as 20X. Proposed changes  to H1B visa program like higher fees and lower numbers threaten India's export earning which have declined for 18 months in a row.  The ongoing election debate over whether the H1B program is hurting American workers rose to public consciousness amid the Republican primary debates this year. The election outcome has the potential to negatively impact Indian H1B exports earnings.

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Comment by Riaz Haq on June 24, 2017 at 5:43pm

#US #lawmakers urge #Trump to press #India's #Modi on #trade, #investment. #ModiMeetsTrump #H1B http://reut.rs/2tHbrAR via @Reuters

Leading U.S. congressmen have called on President Donald Trump to press Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi to remove barriers to U.S. trade and investment when they meet for the first time on Monday.

The lawmakers, from the Republican and Democratic parties, said in a letter to Trump that high-level engagement with India had failed to eliminate major trade and investment barriers and had not deterred India from imposing new ones.

"Many sectors of the Indian economy remain highly and unjustifiably protected, and India continues to be a difficult place for American companies to do business," they wrote, noting that a 2017 World Bank report ranked India 130th out of 190 countries for ease of doing business.

The lawmakers - Republican House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Kevin Brady and Ranking Member Richard Neal, and Republican Senate Finance Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch and Ranking Member Ron Wyden - said the bilateral economic relationship "severely underperforms" as a result of India's failure to enact market-based reforms.

They said the barriers covered multiple sectors and included high tariffs, inadequate protection of intellectual property rights, and inconsistent and non-transparent licensing and regulatory practices.

Among U.S. goods affected were solar and information technology products, telecommunications equipment and biotechnology products, they said.

The lawmakers also pointed to limitations on foreign participation in professional services, restrictive foreign equity caps for financial, retail, and other major services sectors and barriers to digital trade and Internet services.

"The list is long and growing," they said.

Modi is due to meet with about 20 leading U.S. CEOs in Washington on Sunday before his first meeting with Trump on Monday at the White House, when he will seek to revitalize ties that have appeared to drift, in spite of the priority they were afforded under former President Barack Obama.

While progress is expected in defense trade and cooperation, Trump, who campaigned on an "America First" platform has been irritated by the growing U.S. trade deficit with India and has called for reform of the H1B visa system that has benefited Indian tech firms.

Other signs of friction have included Trump accusing New Delhi of negotiating unscrupulously at the Paris climate talks to walk away with billions in aid.

Indian officials reject suggestions that Modi's "Make in India" platform is protectionist and complain about the U.S. regulatory process for generic pharmaceuticals and rules on fruit exports to the United States.

They stress the future importance of the huge Indian market to U.S. firms and major growth in areas such as aviation which will offer significant opportunities for U.S. manufacturers.

Comment by Riaz Haq on May 11, 2018 at 8:44pm

The great Indian trade-off
Sluggish exports leave India needing to curry favour with investors
Perennial domestic weakness, and America’s recent protectionist turn, make it hard for India to sell more abroad

https://www.economist.com/news/finance-and-economics/21742008-peren...

In the 12 months to March 2018, $303bn of Indian goods ended up overseas. That was up on the previous year, but still short of the $310bn achieved in 2014, when the Indian economy was a quarter smaller. Imports, meanwhile, have increased to $460bn, pushing the merchandise deficit to $157bn last year, up from $109bn in 2016-17 and its highest level in five years. A surplus in services such as IT outsourcing helps reduce the overall trade deficit by around half, but even there imports are growing faster than exports.

The shortfall is swollen by the rising price of oil, lots of which India imports (and some of which is also sold on as refined products). The surge from around $30 per barrel in early 2016 to over $70 now goes a long way to explaining the rise in India’s current-account deficit, which is expected to reach 2% of GDP this fiscal year, triple last year’s reading. Gold imports, used for saving or jewellery, have their own unpredictable rhythms, but also deepen the deficit.

The current trade lull extends beyond gold and oil, however. Exporters across the economy are being squeezed by the poor implementation of a goods-and-services tax that came into force last July. Perhaps 100bn rupees ($1.5bn) of refunds due to exporters once they can prove they have shipped their wares abroad is being held up by sclerotic administration. That is working capital which small-time exporters cannot easily replace.

Worse, a $2bn suspected fraud by a diamond dealer in February has resulted in regulators banning certain types of bank guarantees that exporters use to ensure they get paid promptly, exacerbating their funding problems. These snafus come as many firms are still recovering from the ill-advised “demonetisation” of November 2016, when most banknotes were taken out of circulation overnight. The move snagged local supply chains, giving foreign rivals opportunities to fulfil orders that would have gone to hobbled Indian firms and to gain market share in India itself.

Those woes come on top of perennial frailties. Crippling red tape means most Indian firms are small: the country lacks the mega-factories hosting thousands of workers making T-shirts or mobile phones that are common elsewhere in Asia. All but a few firms lack the heft to participate in global supply chains. A relatively strong rupee in recent years has not helped.

Unwilling to enact labour and land-acquisition reforms that might foster larger firms, the Indian government is instead shielding its industry from foreign competition. In recent months it has imposed tariffs on a dizzying array of goods, from mobile phones to kites. Though those will no doubt help stymie imports, it is just as likely that trade measures imposed by other governments will hobble India’s exports.

For it is India’s misfortune that Donald Trump’s America is its biggest source of trade surpluses. Mr Trump’s administration has multiplied the salvos against India, whether decrying supposed export subsidies, making it harder for Indian IT workers to get visas or accusing India of artificially weakening its currency. Unlike many American allies, India has not been exempted from imminent steel tariffs.

India would be seriously damaged by any further escalation in trade conflicts. It needs hard currency from exports not only to finance imports and economic growth, but also to repay external debts. These have swelled to around $500bn, or roughly a fifth of GDP, more than 40% of which is due in less than a year.

Comment by Riaz Haq on June 19, 2019 at 8:23pm

#Trump Admin tells #India it is considering caps on #H1B #visas to #Indians at between 10% and 15% of the annual quota. There is no current country-specific limit on the 85,000 H-1B work visas granted each year, and an estimated 70% go to Indians. https://reut.rs/2x5EdxO


The plan to restrict the popular H-1B visa program, under which skilled foreign workers are brought to the United States each year, comes days ahead of U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s visit to New Delhi.

India, which has upset companies such as Mastercard and irked the U.S. government with stringent new rules on data storage, is the largest recipient of these temporary visas, most of them to workers at big Indian technology firms.

The warning comes as trade tensions between the United States and India have resulted in tit-for-tat tariff actions in recent weeks. From Sunday, India imposed higher tariffs on some U.S. goods, days after Washington withdrew a key trade privilege for New Delhi.

Two senior Indian government officials said on Wednesday they were briefed last week on a U.S. government plan to cap H-1B visas issued each year to Indians at between 10% and 15% of the annual quota. There is no current country-specific limit on the 85,000 H-1B work visas granted each year, and an estimated 70% go to Indians.

Both officials said they were told the plan was linked to the global push for “data localization”, in which a country places restrictions on data as a way to gain better control over it and potentially curb the power of international companies. U.S. firms have lobbied hard against data localization rules around the world.

A Washington-based industry source aware of India-U.S. negotiations also said the United States was deliberating capping the number of H-1B visas in response to global data storage rules. The move, however, was not solely targeted at India, the source said.

“The proposal is that any country that does data localization, then it (H-1B visas) would be limited to about 15% of the quota. It’s being discussed internally in the U.S. government,” the person said.

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Most affected by any such caps would be India’s more than $150 billion IT sector, including Tata Consultancy Services and Infosys Ltd, which uses H-1B visas to fly engineers and developers to service clients in the United States, its biggest market. Major Silicon Valley tech companies also hire workers using the visas.

Stratfor analyst Reva Goujon on Twitter called the move “potentially another big blow to the U.S. #tech industry amid US-#China economic battle,” a sentiment echoed on social media by some Indians and their supporters.

India’s Ministry of External Affairs has sought an “urgent response” from officials on how such a move by the United States could affect India, said one of the two government officials, who declined to be named due to the sensitivity of the matter.

India’s Ministry of External Affairs, as well as the commerce department that is typically involved in such discussions, did not respond to an e-mail seeking comment.

Since last year, the Trump administration has been upset that U.S. companies such as Mastercard and Visa suffer due to regulations in several countries that it says are protectionist and increasingly require companies to store more data locally.

India last year mandated foreign firms to store their payments data “only in India” for supervision, and New Delhi is working on a broad data protection law that would impose strict rules for local processing of data it considers sensitive.

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Comment by Riaz Haq on November 1, 2019 at 8:54am

#WTO says #India violated global #trade rules by providing $7 billion in #export subsidies to its companies, after #UnitedStates had challenged #NewDelhi’s incentive schemes. #Trump revokes trade preferences for #imports from India. https://www.ft.com/content/66e5b84e-fc06-11e9-a354-36acbbb0d9b6 via @financialtimes


The decision was hailed by Robert Lighthizer, the US trade representative, as a “resounding victory” that would allow American companies to compete “on a level playing field”, despite the fact that the Trump administration has questioned the effectiveness and fairness of the WTO’s dispute settlement system. 

India’s ministry of commerce and its embassy in Washington declined to comment on the ruling and whether it would appeal. 

The Trump administration launched its case against India’s export subsidy programmes in March 2018, alleging that India gave prohibited, rapidly expanding support in sectors such as pharmaceuticals, textiles, steel and technology products.

New Delhi said it was entitled to pursue those policies under exemptions allowed for developing countries, even if they were transitioning away from that status. The panel rejected the claim. The WTO urged India to withdraw the export subsidy schemes within six months. If it fails to comply, it could eventually face punitive tariffs from Washington. 


The WTO ruling comes at a tricky time in US-India trade relations. This year, the US administration said it would revoke preferential tariff treatment given to Indian imports, amid rumblings that Washington might launch an investigation into unfair trade practices similar to the one that forms the legal basis for its tariff war with China.

But good relations between Donald Trump, US president, and Narendra Modi, the Indian prime minister, have staved off any serious escalation in tensions between the countries. 

Although the Trump administration has been vigorously litigating cases at the WTO and trumpeting any decisions to its benefit, Washington has blocked the appointment of judges to its appellate body after disagreeing with its methods and some of its rulings. By December, the appellate body will not have a sufficient quorum of judges to continue operating, throwing a spanner in the works of global trade dispute settlement.

The US has called for reforms of the system, but officials in Geneva, where the WTO is based, said there had been little progress towards a solution.

The EU, Canada and others have been working on developing alternative dispute settlement regimes while the WTO appellate body is frozen.

Comment by Riaz Haq on February 17, 2020 at 8:44am

#India's #IT industry head accuses #US of discrimination over
#H1B work visas. In last-ditch lobbying effort ahead of #Trump visit to India this month, Debjani Ghosh, president of #NASSCOM, has sought to meet Trump. #technology
https://www.ft.com/content/4afae768-4f0c-11ea-95a0-43d18ec715f5 via @financialtimes



Nasscom, which has nearly 3,000 companies, including leading IT companies such as Infosys, Tata Consultancy Services and Wipro, argues that the move has disproportionately affected Indian companies.

“We’re at a loss trying to figure out why we’re seeing the kind of discrimination when this is actually benefiting the US,” Ms Ghosh said, arguing that Indian workers help to fill a vital skills gap in the country.

Critics had long complained that the IT firms were using the visas to hire cheaper Indian employees instead of Americans. Indians make up about 70 per cent of workers on H-1B visas in the US. 

But Nasscom counters that most H-1B visas are actually taken by US firms such as Microsoft or Amazon, and that they enjoy higher approval ratings than the Indian companies. Around 80 per cent of H-1B applications from the likes of TCS and Infosys are approved by US immigration authorities, far below approval rates of as much as 99 per cent for the American tech giants.

Stricter H-1B rules have already dented profits for Indian IT firms, with brokerages Kotak saying last year that the additional US visa costs were likely to weigh on earnings before interest and taxes. 

Nasscom is lobbying the two sides to treat the movement of skilled Indian workers under the H-1B scheme as a trade issue, asking that it be separated from the president’s broader concerns about immigration to the US.

“We just have one request to [our] government, which is — talk to him, make him understand the importance of high-skilled talent mobility,” Ms Ghosh said. “We have to ensure that he understands that this cannot be treated the same way as immigration — they’re two different things. That’s our biggest ask.” 

But her pleas are likely to go unheeded. The US and India are negotiating a limited trade package to resolve market access issues for goods such as dairy and medical devices, but a spokesperson from India’s trade ministry confirmed that visa issues have been excluded from the talks. Observers expect that a limited deal could be signed during Mr Trump’s visit to India. 

Ms Ghosh also argued that lingering stigma around Indian workers is misplaced, as the country’s companies have altered their business models away from lower-value outsourcing to higher-skilled tech work, and have started hiring more locals.

“It was about cost arbitrage in the past, where people would send jobs to India for cheaper cost, but that has completely changed,” she said. “People haven’t realised the change that the industry has gone through, the contribution that it’s making to the US.”

Comment by Riaz Haq on February 17, 2020 at 9:50pm

#US court rejects challenge to #Trump administration's requirement for #IT service companies (aka #Indian body shops) to file more evidence when hiring #H1B workers. 70% of 85,000 workers each year come to the #UnitedStates from #India. http://toi.in/ugtlTa72/a24gk via @timesofindia

-------------------------

Trump to Visit India as Trade Fight Overshadows Strategic Ties. #Trump removed #India from preferential #trade program, cut #H1B visas, then went further, and removed India from another program that shielded low-income countries from #US trade reprisals

https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/business/india-business/us-cour...


India and the United States hope to reach a limited trade agreement in time for U.S. President Donald Trump’s first visit to the country this month, but experts question whether the larger strategic relationship both sides have cultivated for more than a decade is being sacrificed to Trump’s niggling trade demands.

On the one hand, U.S. administrations beginning with George W. Bush and continuing under Barack Obama have indicated they need India as a strategic partner to help counter China’s growing influence. On the other hand, under Trump, Washington is now publicly browbeating India over the price of walnuts and Harley-Davidsons.

“The administration does not have an integrated policy toward India or anyone else for that matter,” said Ashley Tellis, an India expert at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

U.S. national security officials have their own view of India’s place in America’s Indo-Pacific strategy and have built on the Obama administration’s efforts with closer defense cooperation, especially in the navy, and through increased arms sales. But U.S. trade officials, obsessed by trade deficits, have their own narrow agenda focused on prying open parts of the Indian market—a view entirely divorced from the bigger picture.

“The fruits of a schizophrenic policy are becoming evident,” Tellis said.

Ahead of Trump’s big state visit on Feb. 24-25, U.S. trade officials led by Robert Lighthizer have been trying to secure a tiny trade breakthrough with India that will give Trump some sort of trade victory with a country long known for hardball negotiations and a reluctance to open its market.

The trade talks are the culmination of three years of escalating tension between the United States and India, which kicked off when the Trump administration levied tariffs on imports of steel and aluminum from India (and many other countries, especially allies). India eventually responded with higher tariffs on agricultural goods and restrictions on U.S. medical devices—prompting the United States to retaliate by removing India from a decades-old preferential trade program that gives developing economies a chance to export on favorable terms to the world’s biggest market. Just last week, the Trump administration went further, removing India from another program that shielded low-income countries from U.S. trade reprisals.

The Trump administration’s approach to trade talks with India, like those with China, Europe, and others, is driven by the president’s obsession with the trade balance: Countries that export more goods to America than they buy in return, he feels, are cheating the United States. India is a top 10 trading partner for America, and the United States runs a trade deficit of about $25 billion—a small fraction of the huge trade gap with China.

To remedy that, U.S. trade officials have tried to force open the Indian market to more U.S. exports, including farm goods, medical devices, and dairy products. The mini trade deal taking shape this month appears to include some Indian concessions on agricultural tariffs and a slight reduction in tariffs on industrial goods like motorcycles—but is a far cry from any sort of comprehensive trade agreement that would address big underlying issues like India’s penchant for protectionism or its treatment of data and e-commerce.

Comment by Riaz Haq on February 27, 2020 at 8:07am

Green card share for skilled #Indian #immigrants (EB-2, EB-5 visas) drops to 10% from 14% as application share rises in 2019. Virtually all applicants for EB-2 and EB-3 green cards are on H-1B visa in #UnitedStates. #Trump #Modi #H1B #India https://bayareane.ws/2w2E01a via @mercnews

While a fierce debate rages over a U.S. Senate bill to scrap per-country green card limits — with opponents claiming it would give unfair advantage to Indian citizens — the share of green cards going to skilled Indian workers has dropped, according to a new report.

Meanwhile, the share of green card applications filed by employers for Indians has risen, according to the report released this week by the Cato Institute.

Skilled Indian workers received 10 percent of available green cards in the two largest green card categories — the EB-2 and EB-3 visas for skilled workers — in 2019, down from 14 percent the year before, the report said. Meanwhile, the share of applications filed for Indian citizens by employers jumped to 53 percent from 50 percent, according to the report.

Virtually all applicants for EB-2 and EB-3 green cards are on the H-1B visa or other temporary work visas, said report author David Bier, a Cato immigration-policy analyst. Hundreds of thousands of foreign citizens, the vast majority from India, are stuck in a green card backlog with wait times reaching decades, Cato has reported.

The disparity between the proportion of green cards allotted to Indians and the share of green card applications made for Indians has persisted for years, but broadened significantly from 2018 to 2019, the report said.

“Nearly all (93 percent) of the immigrants waiting for green cards solely because of the low immigration limits are from India,” the report said.

Under federal law, no single nationality can receive more than 7 percent of the total green cards issued per year, though undistributed green cards can be added to that percentage on a first-come, first-served basis.

A bill to address green card waits, The Fairness for High-Skilled Immigrants Act, passed the U.S. House of Representatives last fall, but has been tied up in the U.S. Senate amid a bitter dispute over whether it is fair to citizens of other countries and U.S. workers to start giving Indian citizens a lion’s share of green cards.

The bill calls for a maximum 85 percent of green cards to be allocated to Indian or Chinese citizens during the first year of implementation. In the second and third years, that would rise to 90 percent.

Bier, in the report, expressed support for the bill, saying the current law creates an “exceptionally unjust system.” Declines in Indians’ share of green cards “will have devastating consequences for recent Indian applicants, effectively guaranteeing that they will not receive green cards at all,” Bier wrote. “Many Indians would die waiting for green cards if they could stick it out, so most will leave the line before then.”

But Center for Immigration Studies lawyer John Miano said the bill “would create a total train wreck in the immigration system.”

Miano pointed to the controversial H-1B visa — intended for jobs requiring specialized skills, used heavily by tech firms and outsourcing companies, and dominated by Indian citizens — as a significant driver of the green card backlog.

Comment by Riaz Haq on April 9, 2020 at 4:04pm

#Indian #H1B Visa Holders Fear Deportation as Unemployed Workers Must Leave US within 60 Days. #Trump #Modi #India #America https://www.dqindia.com/indian-h1b-visa-holders-fear-deportation-un...

Fears of a mass exodus are rising amongst the Indian H1B Visa holders as those who are unemployed have 60 days to find a job or leave the US
Indian H1B Visa holders are facing a tough time in the US due to the rising Coronavirus layoffs that are coming to the fore. What makes matters worse for skilled workers who are either unemployed as of now or may be sacked due to the dwindling economy is the fact that they have just 60 days to find a new job or get deported to their home country. While this was always the rule and is not a new development, in the current scenario it may be difficult for those who are unemployed to find new jobs within the stipulated period of time.

“All of us who are currently employed on H1B Visas are getting mentally prepared that we may lose our jobs, and may have to come back to India as it seems unlikely at the moment that we will get another job within 60 days,” said an Indian IT engineer employed with a reputed company to DataQuest.

There is also an ongoing petition on the White House website requesting the US Government to extend the 60 day grace period to 180 days. The petition says that the US Government must consider extending the grace period as most H1B workers are from India and would not be allowed to travel home with children who are US Citizens as nations across the world have announced an entry ban. The petition, which has about 53,000 signatures as of now, will be taken into consideration only if it reaches 1 lakh signatures.

Apart from Indian H1B Visa holders, those who are on student visas also fear being deported to their home country. Student visa holders who apply for H1B visas to be selected through the lottery system are also at the risk of being sent back as finding employment at the present time seems improbable.

The USCIS selects H1B Visa candidates based on a computer-generated random selection process. When candidates on student visas are offered a job, employers submit the details of the H1B applicants in an online H1B Registration Tool. After the details are submitted a 19 digit number is generated by the system, which is used for internal tracking by the USCIS to run the H1B lottery. Each candidate on student visa gets three chances at the fully electronic H1B lottery system each year. Those who do not get picked for three years will be deported.

“Just last month I had three offers in my hand. As of today, two of those offers have already been withdrawn from the company due to the impact of the Coronavirus on the economy. What must I do should I lose the third offer as well? My visa expires in June, I’m not able to renew that as well,” said a source on a student visa, who does not wish to be named.

Although the situation appears grim as of now, Indian H1B Visa holders remain hopeful of receiving some respite from the Donald Trump government as the H1B community supports the IT industry and are huge contributors to the US economy.

Comment by Riaz Haq on June 24, 2020 at 8:37pm

Why #Trump's #H1Bvisas freeze will hurt #India most. #Indians received half a million #H1B visas issued between 2004 and 2012. Along with their dependents make up more than a fourth of the #Indian-#American population, which is currently around 3 million.https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-53150214

Illegal immigration has long been the subject of fervid debate in the US.

Now President Donald Trump is making "legal immigration a scapegoat" with an eye on the upcoming election, says Poorvi Chotani, a managing partner at Law Quest, an immigration law firm with offices in the US and India.

"How can the US recover more than 17 million lost jobs due to the pandemic by keeping out a little more than half a million foreign workers for the rest of the year?" she told me.

Ms Chotani is mainly alluding to the H-1B visa programme that currently admits 85,000 immigrants each year, many for skilled jobs in the tech industry. On Tuesday, Mr Trump suspended this and other work visas that allowed foreigners to work in the US until the end of 2020.

The move will hit India hard.

Three quarters of the H-1B visas issued every year still go to India-born workers although the top seven Indian tech companies now pick up only 6% of the total visas under this programme.

Rise of Indian-Americans
"This is testimony to the skill sets of Indian nationals. And it has little to do with immigration. The H-1B is about temporary movement of high skilled workers. It doesn't impact net immigration numbers," Shivendra Singh, vice president of global trade development at Nasscom, the Indian technology industry trade group, says.

The H-1B visa programme is also the reason for the "rise of Indian-Americans into the highest educated and highest earning group, immigrant or native in the US," say the authors of The Other One Percent, a study of Indians in America.

US-based researchers Sanjoy Chakravorty, Devesh Kapoor and Nirvikar Singh found that by the early 2010s, some 60% of the 100,000 India-born people entering the US each year through skilled-based paths were on the H-1B programme. They were mainly employed in computer-related occupations.

Nearly half of a million H-1B visas issued between 2004 and 2012 went to Indians. Along with their dependants they accounted for more than a fourth of the Indian-American population, which is currently around 3 million.

President Trump has made a tough immigration stance a key part of his campaign
The new entrants, the researchers noted, spoke different languages, and lived in different places from earlier Indian immigrants.

Hindi, Tamil and Telugu language speakers increased in size. Traditional Indian-American clusters in New York and Michigan were replaced by larger clusters in California and New Jersey. In many ways, the skilled visa programme, led to the birth of a "new map of Indian-Americans".

-------------

The future of the H-1B visa programme has been always difficult to predict, and has been susceptible to anti-immigration pressures. Steve Yale-Loehr, a Cornell law professor told the New York Times that this was the "largest crackdown on work visas that I have seen in my 35 years of practice".

It is unclear what will happen next. With the pandemic showing the world how to work remotely, will a post Covid future see a drastic reduction in the visas and more professionals working from home as businesses reduce dependencies on visas? Will short-term "technology visas" ease out relatively long term ones like H-1B?

"An overhaul of the immigration system has long been in process. Things have now been pushed over the edge because of the upcoming US presidential polls. It's all driven by populism, exacerbated by the pandemic and the rise in unemployment" says Ms Chotani.

Comment by Riaz Haq on August 3, 2020 at 7:13am

Supply Of Services Outside India By "Intermediaries" Not Export, And Hence, Subject To IGST: Gujarat HC [Read Judgment]

https://www.livelaw.in/news-updates/supply-of-services-outside-indi...

"Only because, the invoices are raised on the person outside India with regard to the commission and foreign exchange is received in India, it would not qualify to be export of services, more particularly when the legislature has thought it fit to consider the place of supply of services as place of person who provides such service in India", stated the bench.

https://www.livelaw.in/news-updates/supply-of-services-outside-indi...


The Gujarat High Court has ruled that supply of services outside India by "intermediaries" in India is not an export, thereby continuing their liability.

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    Biden's Gaza Ceasefire Veto Defies American Public Opinion

    Aaron Bushnell, an active serviceman in the United States Air Force, burned himself to death in front of the Israeli Embassy in protest against the US policy in Gaza. Before setting himself on fire in what he called an "extreme act of protest", he said he would "no longer be complicit in genocide". Polls show that the vast majority (63%) of Americans want an immediate end to the carnage being perpetrated by Israel in Gaza.  …

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    Posted by Riaz Haq on February 27, 2024 at 5:30pm

    Pakistan Elections: Imran Khan's Supporters Skillfully Used Tech to Defy Powerful Military

    Independent candidates backed by the Pakistan Tehreek e Insaf (PTI) party emerged as the largest single block with 93 seats in the nation's parliament in the general elections held on February 8, 2024.  This feat was accomplished in spite of huge obstacles thrown in front of the PTI's top leader Imran Khan and his party leaders and supporters by Pakistan's powerful military…

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    Posted by Riaz Haq on February 16, 2024 at 9:22pm — 1 Comment

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