Virendra Pandit
New Delhi: President Donald Trump’s recent announcement of steeply hiking the one-time H-1B visa fee to USD 100,000 (Rs. 88 lakh) will impact American start-ups and innovators more than it will India’s IT services exports, according to the US-India Strategic Partnership Forum (USISPF) President and CEO Mukesh Aghi.
“It works in India’s favour because, from the US perspective, H-1B visas were being abused in some manner, and they would like to bring in high-quality people to the US,” a media report quoted him as saying on Wednesday.
Therefore, Indian skilled workers going to the US on H-1B visas will receive significantly higher compensation, while low-end work is likely to shift offshore to India. The move will have minimal impact on India’s IT service exports, but will hit America’s own startups more, he said.
About the 50 percent US tariffs imposed on Indian imports, Aghi said the broader relationship between the two countries will continue to move forward despite trade challenges.
Their bilateral relationship goes beyond trade. Geopolitically aligned, it’s focused a lot on people-to-people ties and technology transfer. “You have US companies setting up hundreds of global capability centres in India, as well as in innovation itself. I believe trade issues will settle down and the relationship will start moving in the right trajectory pretty soon,” he added.
Meanwhile, according to a related Federal Register notice, the Trump administration released a proposal on Tuesday that would rework the H-1B visa selection process to favour higher-skilled and better-paid workers, a move that follows a White House proclamation on Friday last week introducing a USD 100,000 fee for these visas.
The new process, if finalized, would give heavier weight to applications by employers paying high wages if annual requests for the visas exceed the statutory limit of 85,000, the notice said, adding, the move aims to better protect Americans from unfair wage competition from foreign workers.
As part of a wide-ranging immigration crackdown since January, the Trump administration intensified its focus on the H-1B program, popular with technology and outsourcing companies for hiring skilled foreign workers, the media reported.
The planned regulation posted on Tuesday would change an existing lottery process to obtain the visas if demand surpasses supply in a given year, creating wage tiers where higher-paying jobs would have a better chance of being selected.
The process to finalize a regulation can take months or even years. The notice suggested the new rules could be in place for the 2026 lottery, meaning before a March registration period.
The total wages paid to H-1B workers would increase to USD 502 million in fiscal year 2026, which begins on October 1, the notice said, citing US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) estimates.
An estimated 5,200 small businesses that currently receive H-1B visas would suffer a significant economic impact due to loss of labour, DHS said.
The US Citizenship and Immigration Services, which issued the proposal, will give the public 30 days to comment beginning on Wednesday, the notice said.