Green Card backlog Indian Americans hold protest in US

Washington: A group of Indian American frontline healthcare workers languishing in the Green Card backlog held a demonstration in front of the US Capitol urging lawmakers and the Biden administration to end the per capita country-specific quota. A Green Card, known officially as a Permanent Resident Card, is a document issued to immigrants to the US as evidence that the bearer has been granted the privilege of residing permanently in the country.

Indian IT professionals, most of whom are highly skilled and come to the US mainly on the H-1B work visas, are the worst sufferers of the current immigration system which imposes a seven per cent per country quota on allotment of the coveted Green Card or permanent legal residency.

"We are frontline Covid warriors, and we are here to tell how we have been short-changed into a life of perpetual indentured servitude. Each of us has a story. We are here from all over the country asking for justice. Justice that has precluded us for decades now," Dr Raj Karnatak, infectious disease and critical care physician and Dr Pranav Singh, a pulmonary and critical care physician, said.