Indian IT firms to meet U.S. officials on visa reform concerns

Indian IT sector leaders will meet both U.S. lawmakers and officials from U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration later this month to lobby against any major changes to visa regulations that could hurt the country’s $150 billion industry.

R. Chandrashekhar, head of Indian IT industry body Nasscom, said details of the visit were still being finalised, but chief executives from some of India’s big IT companies would be part of a delegation visiting Washington in the week of Feb. 20.

India’s software services industry is concerned about a bill introduced in the U.S. Congress seeking to double the salary paid to H-1B visa holders which would dramatically increase the costs for the Indian companies employing them.

Indian IT service companies use H-1B visas to fly engineers to the U.S., their biggest market, to service clients, but some opponents in the United States argue they are misusing the programme to replace U.S. jobs.

Earlier in the week, Nasscom warned that a bill, introduced last month by Congresswoman Zoe Lofgren, a Democrat from California, unfairly targets some of its members and will not solve a U.S. labour shortage in the tech sector.

India’s IT firms, led by Tata Consultancy Services (TCS.NS), Infosys (INFY.NS) and Wipro (WIPR.NS), have seen growth slow in 2016, as customers delayed spending ahead of the U.S. presidential election.

Speculation that Trump may issue an executive order curbing the H-1B programme sent shares in IT companies tumbling this week.

India’s Ministry of External Affairs said it had expressed its concerns to the U.S. government.

The ministry told reporters on Thursday that no executive order has been signed so far and such bills have been introduced in the past too but such bills have to go through the full Congressional process. So let’s not prejudge the outcome.

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Source:Reuters