Indian students face challenges as US plans to end work visa programme

New York: The US administration is set to introduce a new bill to stop foreign students from seeking temporary employment in the country after completing their studies, according to Scroll.in.

If passed, the law will require international students including Indians to leave the US after their academic programme or seek to get an H-1B visa at the earliest, according to Economic Times.

The bill comes amid President Trump’s aggressive crackdown on immigrants alongside his more insular tariff policy that has already caused financial chaos around the world.

However, the previous efforts to abolish the Optional Practical Training program, which allows foreign graduates to work in the US for up to a year after their education, have failed.

The programme allows those pursuing science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) to extend this authorisation for up to two more years.

A report by Open Doors, an information resource on international students, claims that more than 3.31 lakh students from India were enrolled in various programmes in the US for 2023-24.

It is reported that over a third of those enrolled in this period were eligible for the Optional Practical Training program for work authorization.

However, the Fairness for High-Skilled Americans Act seeks to end the aforementioned Optional Practical Training programme claiming that the program ‘undercuts American workers, particularly higher-skilled workers and recent college graduates, by giving employers a tax incentive to hire inexpensive, foreign labor under the guise of student training’.

The advocacy group, NumbersUSA that supports reducing immigration, said that the law could ‘encourage domestic recruitment of our best and brightest’.

Roy Beck, the founder of the organization, reportedly asked ‘Why should our government discourage employers from hiring our home-grown graduates?’ adding that the law would help fewer than half of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics( STEM) ‘graduates find careers in their fields’.

With the passing of the bill, Indian students will either have to leave the country immediately or seek to get H-1B visa, according to the report.

The non-immigrant H-1B visa permits the US companies to temporarily employ foreign workers for special jobs.