Former US ambassadors to India urge scrapping of 'protectionist' visa rule changes

MUMBAI: Five former US ambassadors to India have written a letter urging the United States Congress to reconsider changes to its H1-B visa program, saying they were not in the economic interests of the United States, were protectionist and would complicate relations with India.
The U.S. Senate has passed changes to the H1-B visa program, mainly used by Indian IT firms, as part of an overhaul of U.S. immigration laws. The new restrictions prevent companies from placing workers in visas at a client site, fundamentally upsetting the business model of Indian companies. The rules also make it more expensive for companies dependent on visas to apply for new ones. The U.S. House of Representatives is considering its own version of immigration reform.

The Indian government and IT firms have been lobbying to try and prevent the Senate’s changes to the visa program from becoming law.

“The Comprehensive Immigration Reform Legislation that has passed the U.S. Senate unfortunately differentiates between U.S. providers of IT and Indian IT companies which provide the same services to American businesses using virtually the same labour pool sourced from India,” former ambassadors Thomas Pickering, Frank Wisner, Richard Celeste, David Mulford and Robert Mulford said in the letter.

The letter was posted on the website of the Coalition for Jobs and Growth, which is a lobbying group formed to tackle on immigration reform, formed by the US-India Business Council.

The ambassadors added that the legislation sends a protectionist signal and risks provoking tit-for-tat retaliation.

“We would appreciate your bringing our concerns to the attention of those who are responsible for the preparation of the final comprehensive immigration legislations and ask that they revise those section and remove those features of any bill that would limit market entry of IT professionals who work for so-called visa-dependent IT companies. These provisions..are virtually punitive and cry out for redress and excision,” the former ambassadors said.