After the US President Donald Trump signed an executive order with aim to bring jobs back to American workers and overhaul the H-1B visa guest worker programme during a visit, to the headquarters of tool manufacturer Snap-On on Tuesday, April 18, 2017 in Kenosha, Wisconsin. 

Indian seekers of H-1B visa have a mixed reaction to this. Some have optimistic views on this decision but some have negativities running through their mind. There are many such cases.

Also read: To End misuse of H-1B, Trump signs ‘buy American, hire American’ order

Neha Gayal, a 22-year-old graduate engineer from a government college in Pune, seeking to move to the United States, is trying to look at the positive side of President Donald Trump’s executive order restricting the use of H-1B visas. She says that the order will most likely to impact only students graduated from engineering colleges that are poorly ranked. Many companies hire students passing out from an average rated engineering colleges on low salary and take them to US. This will possibly end now, enhancing the chances of others who studied in renowned institutions and own advanced degrees.

Others were not so optimistic.     

An IT professional Mangesh Joshi feels the “buy American, hire American” order will have adverse effect on Indian job-seekers.

Joshi said, that the US will block visa applications for low wages workers as the order states that America only seeks highest skilled and paid labor.

These time-limited work visas are primarily used by scientists, engineers and computer programmers sought by Silicon. Thousands of Indian professionals are employed by American companies annually through Valley.

The Trump administration says the order is aimed at stopping the abuse of the H-1B visa programme and providing jobs back to Americans, that is one of his major campaign promises.

The US grants 85,000 H-1B visas every year, most of which are snapped up by Indian outsourcers whose employees fill a skill gap in US engineering. Applications are vastly oversubscribed and visas are allocated via a lottery system.

It is this lottery system which the Trump administration says is misused by Indian companies, a charge denied by industry body NASSCOM.

So far reactions in India are mixed.           

Akash Rathi, a fresh graduate from Pune, too said the new changes might help Indians.

“While Indians have been the biggest beneficiaries of H-1B visas, the expected change of substantial increase in minimum salary level might force IT companies to take away US jobs elsewhere to countries like India.”

But IT professional Darshan Srinivasan, who has visited the US and other countries for onsite projects, said the order has come as a blow to workers in the sector.

“Morale of employees has taken a visible hit,” he said in Bengaluru.

Srinivasan said service-based companies were to blame for violations related to H-1B visas. “Product-based companies have to suffer as a result,” he said.

Indian IT companies will be hit by America’s new H-1B visa order

According to Kishore Kumar Kovuru, a software engineer who returned to India after working in the US for a decade, Indians who were getting extension of H-1B visa every two years might find it difficult now.

“With the US government firm on restricting foreigners in regular jobs, there will be serious review of the H1-B visa holders when they apply for extensions,” he told HT in Hyderabad.

“So is the case with fresh applicants. Unless the US government is satisfied that the applicants are highly-qualified and the US companies cannot find alternatives to them, it will be difficult to get visas.”

Ramesh Loganathan, former president of Hyderabad Software Exporters’ Association, however, said there “is absolutely no need to panic about the latest order” as it will benefit highly skilled Indians in the long run.

“Previously, many Indians obtained H-1B visas through various methods to join forged companies. The present order will affect such people,” he said.

“But for highly skilled and highly paid Indians like architects and software developers, it is, in fact, a good development unless the US government reduces the number of H-1 B visas, which is very unlikely.”

You may also Read: Indian students’ stance Canada, Ireland: H-1B Visa Crackdown

According to Loganathan, Telangana and Andhra Pradesh account for 40-45% of the total number of 60,000 H-1B temporary visas from India every year.

NASSCOM on Wednesday cautioned the US government that “hindering access to needed talent” could only harm American companies.

“Any onerous additional restrictions on the H-1B...would hurt thousands of US businesses and their efforts to be more competitive by hindering access to needed talent,” NASSCOM said in a statement.

Simply reviewing H-1B programme is too little too late, say US lawmakers 

NASSCOM president R Chandrashekhar said the body was against selective targeting of Indian companies, which account for only “20 per cent” of the visas.

“Any such move will not benefit the American worker, which is the intention behind the move,” he said, adding that “using salary levels as the metric is not necessarily the best indicator of benefits to the US economy”.

Also Read: H-1B visa it’s hard to recover in fy18 for it investors