Petition Seeks H-1B Visa Stamping Within The US.

The family of Mahesh in Iowa has been staying up at night for the past many days to look for a visa stamping date in their home country India.

The family hasn’t visited India for 3 years now as they could not ensure their timely return to the US due to the current massive backlog for stamping dates for H-1B visas.

On the other hand, N. Kumar’s mother, who is in Bengaluru, India, has been keeping unwell and has required hospitalization.

“In my area of work, I can’t be away from the office for too long, and I do need to give a return date to my employer,” Kumar says.

Mahesh and Kumar are just 2 examples of how a delayed visa stamping cycle is affecting thousands of professionals working in America on visas.

Many Indians who find themselves in this frustrating situation are doing everything from approaching Congressmen to conducting rallies and online awareness campaigns.

Recently, a petition has been started on Change.org to urge the USCIS to change the cumbersome rule of having to travel outside the country to get their visas stamped after they have been approved in the US.

The petition that has been signed by over 52,000 people so far says, “ Once approval is obtained, thousands of said US resident workers scramble to get time off work to travel to their home countries, Canada or Mexico, to get their H1B stamped to facilitate international travel.

“Since Covid-19, newly minted H-1B workers resident in the US and H-1B holders with expired visa stamps have struggled greatly to leave the US to get stamped,” it says, urging “the department of homeland security to begin stamping H-1B domestically (within the US).”