Nasscom said while the visa programme has been used by companies to address the skill gap in the US by bringing in foreign employees, the number of H-1B employees from Indian companies have come down substantially over the last decade.

Information technology services industry body Nasscom said the proposed increase in H-1B visa fees needs to be viewed in the context of the programme’s original purpose of enabling access to temporary skills where there is a shortage in the US.
The US government has proposed a new $103,265 fee for cap-subject H-1B petitions, as the earlier $100,000 payment has run into legal challenges and is set to expire next month.
The draft proposal will be open for public comments and will take a few months for finalisation.
Nasscom said while the visa programme has been used by companies to address the skill gap in the US by bringing in foreign employees, the number of H-1B employees from Indian companies have come down substantially over the last decade.
This is because the IT industry stepped up local hiring by tying up with US universities.
‘The industry has also spent more than $1.1 billion for strengthening the STEM pipeline in the US, working with more than 130 universities and colleges. It is impacting 2.9 million students and upskilling more than 255,000 employees,’ Nasscom said in a statement.
It added that it was engaged with all key stakeholders.
If passed, this new fee will substantially increase the cost of hiring foreign workers.
It will be an addition to all existing H-1B filing and statutory fees.
However, H-1B petitions that are exempt from annual cap will not be subject to new fees.
The US government has been adopting many measures to stem the influx of skilled immigrants through the visa process in the country.
It alleges that they take away jobs from locals even while those immigrants are paid far less than prevailing US wages.
These measures have already seen a significant drop in IT companies opting for H-1B visas.
The number of properly submitted, or eligible registrations, tanked 38.5 per cent to 211,600 for FY27, from 343,981 a year earlier, the US Citizens and Immigration Services (USCIS) said in May.
The FY27 numbers are at least a seven-year low, with the peak being in 2024 with 758,994 registrations, according to the agency’s web site.
Data sourced from specialist staffing firm Xpheno show a steep drop in total applications by 18 Indian listed IT services firms and Cognizant between 2025 and 2024, which tanked to 8,160 from 36,453.
IT companies such as TCS, Infosys, and Cognizant have thus filed for extensions for H-1B visas for onsite employees.
At the same time, there has been an increase in the number of transfer petitions, though that could not be immediately quantified.
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