US policy shift jolts Indian IT as H1B route tightens

The India-US relationship has gone through a rough patch in 2025. And the immediate casualty has been the Indian IT industry. After the imposition of a 50 per cent punitive tariff coupled with an inordinate delay in finalisation of a trade deal, the US has shown all indication of a strategic reset in ties. Its reflection has already been visible in the people-to-people movement between India and the US. The H1B visa programme has been a very popular route for Indian professionals to stay and work in the US.

Indian IT services companies and global tech firms have used it for more than two decades for sending IT professionals to the US to work in the client geographies. All big technology companies’ CEOs, including Sundar Pichai of Google and Satya Nadella of Microsoft, have been the key beneficiaries of American immigration programmes that attract global talent from all nations.

It has been the life blood of American innovations for years. Now, the US under Donald Trump has taken a sharp turn with regard to immigration policies. During the year, the US administration has imposed a high entry fee of $100,000 per new H1B applicant. This has now made sending IT professionals to the US difficult. Management of many Indian IT firms has publicly said that they are not applying for H1B visas under the new programme. Another move by the Trump administration has literally put the death nail on this system. In December, the US has decided to scrap the lottery system followed for years. From February 2026, H1B visa applications will be evaluated on the basis of experience and wages.

It means senior professionals will be preferred under the new system. Meanwhile, deliberate procedural delays have crept into the system. Applications are evaluated at snail’s pace, and appointments for visa interviews are pushed back by several months. These measures show the US is actively discouraging Indians from coming to their country.

Now, the question comes: is the American dream over? Nobody knows the answer. The MAGA support base of Trump is spewing venom on Indians in the US for no reason. Indians only constitute 1.5 per cent of the American population. They are law-abiding and wealthy. Many have created thousands of jobs of American people and actively contributed towards America’s growth in the world stage. However, these facts are being ignored, and racial abuses are encouraged.

For the time being, it seems the American dream of many Indians is over. Indian students’ enrolment in the US has fallen by 40 per cent this year. IT companies are not sending professionals to the US. In 2026, things are not going to be very different from 2025. American technology giants have leadership positions in the Indian market across most fields. It is important to tap the growing consumer class of the world’s fourth-largest economy, for which major American brands are keen to operate in India. However, the US government’s actions seem contrary to the growth in the Indo-US relationship. It has to be seen whether such a shift is structural or limited to the policies of the current administration.