24 Percent Rise in U.S. Visas for Indians
By siliconindia   |   Friday, 28 October 2011, 00:37 IST   |    1 Comments
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24 Percent Rise in U.S. Visas for Indians
Bangalore: The H-1B visas, has gone up by 24 percent in 2010-2011, which allows skilled professionals to work on a temporary basis in the U.S. There was a higher rate of rejection from U.S and India had been consistently pressing the U.S for a quick solution on the problem faced by IT Industry over the H1-B visas. The total number of H-1B visas gone up from 54,111 issued in 2010 to 67,195 in 2011. The U.S. embassy said that this 24 percent increase is tied to the highest ever H-1B application and issuance rates in the history of the U.S. mission to India, and illustrates the booming nature of U.S.-India business relations. India is the single largest beneficiary of H-1B visas by a wide margin. In the past four years, applicants in India have received more than twice as many H-1B visas as the four next-highest countries combined. H-1B visas to Indians are limited at 65,000 for regular applicants while another 20,000 are available for those with master degrees from U.S. universities. In the previous two years, there has been a big fall in the demand for H-1B visas because of lower number of jobs owing to the ongoing slowdown. India also remains top in L1, or an intra-company transfer visa, with more than 25,000 L1s in FY 2011, which is 37 percent of worldwide issuances, reports Economic Times. Also, the U.S. mission issued over 4,90,000 non-immigrant visas to Indian tourists, students and businessmen in the last year which is an increase of 4.3 percent from the last financial year. Sudhir Shah, a Mumbai-based immigration lawyer said, "The rise in the number of applicants mostly comes from Indian students who are studying in U.S. universities and finish around June and July. Earlier, the cap used to be hit within a day or two after applications started to be accepted on April 1. Now they don't get filled up and students who become eligible only after they finish their courses can also apply. They are also eligible to apply under the special 20,000 quota reserved for them which get filled up even now."

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