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US Government Rubbishes Reports of H-1B Visa Cap for Indians

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This comes following Thursday's media reports suggesting that amid escalating trade tensions, the US warned India it's considering caps on H-1B visas for Indian expats.

New Delhi (Sputnik): The US government has stated it has no plans to cap H-1B visa for workers from India or any other country that adopts laws to restrict data being taken out of their countries.

 “The Trump Administration’s Buy American Hire American Executive Order called for a broad review of U.S. worker visa programmes, including the H-1B program,” the US State Department said in a statement on Friday. “This review it is not targeted at a specific country and is completely separate from our ongoing discussions with India about the importance of ensuring the free flow of data across borders.”

Silicon Valley tech companies hire many Indian workers using these visas.

On Thursday, a report suggested that the US warned India that it is considering a cap on H-1B work visas on nations pressurising American firms to store data in their local territories. The report claimed that any country that pushes for data localisation would have its H-1B visas limited to about 15% of the quota. India last year mandated foreign firms to store their payments data “only in India” for supervision.

The visa cap would have affected India’s over $150 billion IT sector, including behemoths like Tata Consultancy Services and Infosys Ltd. 

The statement holds significance coming amid Indo-US trade tensions after India’s retaliatory tariffs on 28 US products came into effect on 16 June. The tariffs imposed by India were seen as a response to the US' refusal to exempt India from higher taxes on steel and aluminium imports.

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo will visit India on 24 June as part of his South Asia tour, which also includes Sri Lanka.

Pompeo’s visit comes ahead of the G-20 Summit in the Japan’s city of Osaka, which will run from 28-29 June.

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