Indians got 38 per cent H-1B visas last year

Indian nationals topped the list of H-1B work visas for highly skilled categories issued by the United States last year making up 38 per cent of the total, according to an official report.

India also accounts for maximum number of people entering the US on L-1 visa, which is primarily used for intra-company transferees, said the Annual Flow Report released by the Office of Immigration Statistics.                     

The report said Indian nationals accounted for 157,726 (37.8 per cent) of the 409,619 H-1B admissions in the US in 2008. In terms of numbers, this is a drop of about 3000 as compared to 2007. In 2006 the figure was 125,717.                    

Canada came a distant second in terms of H-1B visa admissions. In 2008 as many as 23,312 (5.7 per cent) Canadian nationals were admitted to the US on this visa category, followed by the United Kingdom (4.7 per cent).                      

Nationals from these three countries accounted for 48 per cent of H1B admissions.        A record 1,046,539 persons were naturalised in the US in 2008 with those born in Mexico 231,815 (22 percent) topping the list. India came next with 65,971(6.3 per cent), followed by the Philippines (5.6 per cent) with 58,792, China with 40,017 (3.8 per cent) and Cuba with 39,871 (3.8 per cent).                 

The largest number of persons naturalising lived in California (297,909), Florida (128,328), and New York (90,572).               

The 10 countries with the largest number of naturalisations accounted for 57 per cent of all new citizens in 2008.                       

The leading countries of citizenship for resident non-immigrant admissions to the United States in 2008 were Mexico (12 per cent), India (12 per cent), Japan (7 per cent), South Korea (5.9 per cent), and the United Kingdom (5.9 per cent).                   

These five countries accounted for more than 40 percent of resident non-immigrant admissions to the United States. From 2007 to 2008, notable increases in resident non-immigrant admissions occurred among citizens from China (19 per cent increase), Mexico (16 per cent increase), and India (5.6 per cent increase).                 

Increased admissions from India were concentrated among academic student (F1) and intracompany transferee (L1) classes.                      

Nearly half of academic student admissions (F1) were nationals of five countries: South Korea (15 per cent), China (11 per cent), India (9.9 per cent), Japan (6.8 per cent), and Mexico (6.3 per cent).                

Between 2006 and 2008, South Korea, China, and India showed consistent increases in F1 admissions, while admissions from Japan declined during the same period.