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Nearly 200,000 IT employees have misplaced job since November final yr, recommend studies. (Representational)
Washington:
Thousands of Indian IT professionals within the US, who’ve misplaced their jobs as a result of sequence of latest layoffs at corporations like Google, Microsoft and Amazon, are actually struggling to seek out new employment throughout the stipulated interval beneath their work visas following the termination of their employment to remain within the nation.
According to The Washington Post, almost 200,000 IT employees have been laid off since November final yr, together with some file numbers in corporations like Google, Microsoft, Facebook and Amazon.
As per some trade insiders, between 30 to 40 per cent of them are Indian IT professionals, a big variety of whom are on H-1B and L1 visas.
The H-1B visa is a non-immigrant visa that permits US corporations to make use of international employees in speciality occupations that require theoretical or technical experience. Technology corporations depend upon it to rent tens of hundreds of workers annually from international locations like India and China.
L-1A and L-1B visas can be found for non permanent intracompany transferees who work in managerial positions or have specialised data.
A considerably massive variety of Indian IT professionals, who’re on non-immigrant work visas like H-1B are L1, are actually scrambling for choices to remain within the US to discover a new job within the stipulated few months time that they get beneath these international work visas after shedding their jobs and alter their visa standing as properly.
Amazon staffer Gita (title modified) arrived within the US solely three months in the past. This week she was advised that March 20 is her final working day.
The state of affairs is getting worse for these on H-1B visas as they must discover a new job inside 60 days or else, they might be left with no different possibility however to go again to India.
Under present circumstances, when all IT corporations are on a firing spree, getting a job inside that quick interval, they really feel is subsequent to unattainable.
Sita (title modified), one other IT skilled on an H-1B visa, received laid off from Microsoft on January 18. She is a single mom. Her son is in High School Junior yr, getting ready for entering into faculty.
“This state of affairs is actually exhausting on us,” she stated.
“It is unlucky that hundreds of tech workers are dealing with layoffs, notably these on H-1B visas who’re dealing with further challenges as they have to discover a new job and switch their visa inside 60 days of termination or threat leaving the nation,” Silicon Valley-based entrepreneur and group chief Ajay Jain Bhutoria stated.
“This can have devastating penalties for households, together with the sale of properties and disruptions to kids’s training. It can be helpful for tech corporations to point out particular consideration for H-1B employees and lengthen their termination date by a couple of months, because the job market and recruitment course of might be difficult,” he stated.
Global Indian Technology Professionals Association (GITPRO) and Foundation for India and Indian Diaspora Studies (FIIDS) on Sunday launched a community-wide effort to attempt to assist these IT professionals by connecting job seekers to job referrers and informers. FIIDS will work on efforts to affect policymakers and decision-makers of US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS).
“With huge layoffs within the tech trade, January 2023 has been brutal for tech professionals. Many gifted people misplaced their jobs. As the tech trade is dominated by Indian immigrants, they’re the best to get impacted,” Khande Rao Kand stated.
The laid-off H-1B holders want to seek out an H-1B sponsoring job in 60 days or go away inside 10 days after changing into out of standing.
“This has an enormous disruption on the household lives and youngsters’s training and so forth on this tax-paying and contributing authorized immigrant,” Khande Rao Kand from FIIDS stated.
Mr Bhutoria stated it will be helpful for the immigration course of to be redesigned to higher help H-1B employees and retain extremely expert expertise within the US.
In deep misery, the fired Indian IT employees have shaped numerous WhatsApp teams to seek out methods to have an answer to the horrible state of affairs they’re in.
In one of many WhatsApp teams, there are greater than 800 jobless Indian IT employees who’re circulating amongst themselves vacancies showing within the nation.
In one other group, they’ve been discussing numerous visa choices, with some immigration attorneys who’ve volunteered to supply their consultancy companies throughout this time.
“These circumstances have such a devastating impact on us immigrants and are nerve-wracking. We are kinda misplaced,” stated Rakesh (title modified) was laid off from Microsoft on Thursday. He is within the US on an H-1B visa.
Adding to the miseries of Indian IT professionals is the most recent choice of Google that they’re pausing their Green Card processing. This is primarily as a result of, at a time after they have fired hundreds of workers, they can’t be seen arguing earlier than the USCIS that they want a international IT skilled as a everlasting resident. Other corporations are anticipated to observe the identical.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV workers and is revealed from a syndicated feed.)
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