Hyderabad: The Visa interview process for US-bound students will soon be made extra rigorous. The system overhaul comes after several Indian students — most of them from Andhra Pradesh and Telangana — were sent back from American universities, recently. In the most extreme of cases, a few students were sent back soon after landing at US airports.
US Ambassador to India, Richard Rahul Verma, announced the overhaul while speaking to the press here on Friday. Mr Verma said there was an immediate need to weed out unscrupulous elements from both countries and that it was the responsibility of both India and the United States to make sure students and their parents were protected against hardship after the granting of a Visa.
Mr Verma also advised students to make sure they had adequate financial resources before travelling to the US for higher studies. He reiterated the fact that a Visa only granted port of entry, not a guaranteed permit to enter the country. Entry into a US territory from its port of entry is allowed only after clearance from the country’s Department of Homeland Security.
The American ambassador also said that he wanted more American students coming to India for studies. Speaking on H1B Visa fees hike he said that India still gets lion’s share of Visas. Mr Verma described the India-US relationship as the “defining partnership of the 20th century” and said that “when India-US come together the world will be a safer place”. He was speaking on the sidelines of ‘The future is now: India — From COP21 to Reality’, a two-day conference that’s being held in the city.
Mr Verma also fielded a question on Britain’s exit from the European Union, on Friday. “It is a democratic process and we now have to see how the implementation rolls out in the months to come. This is something for the people of Great Britain to judge now — how best to take this forward,” Mr Verma said.
