US planes destined for Punjab’s Amritsar were on their way with 205 undocumented Indians as part of President Donald Trump’s deportation plans as India confirmed their identities without comment and six more planes are due to land in the country shortly.
India has not protested the return of undocumented Indians from the US as the country itself faces problems of illegal migration from neighbouring countries such as Bangladeshi Muslims into Assam, Bengal, and minority Burmese Rohingyas into eastern states.
Over 18,000 undocumented Indians are to be deported to India by the US in the coming months as part of President Donald Trump’s election pledge to deport over 17 million illegal undocumented workers in the USA. Per Pew research centre 725,000 Indians are working in the USA now on H-1B visas which the GOP wants to abolish but Elon Musk of DOGE does not want to scrap, and Prez Trump supports him.
The deportation of undocumented Indians is part of the mass deportation plan of the US President Trump who vowed on his campaign trail that aliens would be deported to combat the higher incidence of crime, violence and smuggling of fentanyl drugs especially on the streets of New York and other major cities and adding pressure on state governments finances in rehabilitating them in camps.
Trump was a hard-core critic of the open borders policy of the Democratic government which allowed migrants into the country on grounds of their seeking asylum from despotic regimes in their countries – essentially from South America (Venezuela), North America (Mexico and Canada) and Central America (Guatemala).
The deportation of the illegal Indians staying in the US without papers comes a week ahead of the Indian premier Narendra Modi’s scheduled visit to the United States on or around Feb 12th to discuss the latest developments in geo-politics such as relations with China and Russia. The Russian president Vladimir Putin is expected on a scheduled visit this week for discussions before Modi take his Air Force one to the US.
Dr S Jaishankar had visited to the US to calm the frayed tempers of Trump in order to seek an invite for PM Modi who enjoyed the best of relations during his first term which included the historic Howdy Mody visit and Trump’s reciprocal visit at the Motera stadium in Ahmedabad.
These theories were however flatly denied by Dr S Jaishankar himself that his official visit and he did not go there with the express purpose of seeking an invite for Mr Modi.
The GOP wants the H-1B programme to be scrapped. They want American labour to be encouraged. But Trump has backed Musk’s plan to expand the H-1B programme saying he himself employed H-1Bs on his projects.
The Indian diaspora in the United States is about 5.2 million strong contributing over 2 billion in taxes to the US treasuries.
Birthright citizenship is another issue that may come up for discussion with the US president in view of the large number of H-1B visa holders working in technology sectors which includes IT, Computer Sciences, Academics, IT enabled services and health care sector, a large number of doctors to be and nurses are H-1B visa holders constitute a vast majority of the health care force.
Some 77% of workforce in the Silicon Valley in software are Indian engineers from reputed Indian universities such as IIT’s, the only one recognised by the US government and regional engineering colleges.
Many Indians including Vivek Ramaswamy, Kamala Harris, Nikki Haley and so many others whose parents migrated to the US years ago are important beneficiaries of birthright citizenship. All of them have made significant contributions to the US economy. Ramaswamy is a billionaire who made his fortune in the biotechnology sector, he was married to an Indian and his children enjoy birthright citizenship. So do Nikki Haley’s children. Harris did not have any children but adopted her husband’s children from the first wife as her children.
Migration to USA by Indians was restricted to metropolitan cities such as New Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, and Kolkata. But the technology boom in the 90s and India’s opening up of the economy to FDI and portfolio investments which was taken advantage by US multinationals, which lacked access earlier, led mass migration from tier 2 cities such as Hyderabad, Bengaluru, the software capital of India and equivalent of the US Silicon Valley, Pune, Nagpur, Madurai, Trichy and Coimbatore, and even smaller cities.
Most of them have become US citizens and their children have become birthright citizens. India might see the new rule as being discriminatory to the new crop H-1B visa holders working in the USA and marrying other H-1B visa holders, or Indian Americans, and Modi is likely to bring up this issue of uncertainty for a skilled work force contributing to the progress and prosperity of the United States.
India foreign minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar has therefore said New Delhi is open to the return of undocumented Indians in the United States. His comments came following a meeting with U.S. foreign secretary Marco Rubio in Washington during which illegal immigration was one of the issues discussed.
Saying that New Delhi was firmly opposed to illegal migration, he told reporters that “We have always taken the view that if there are any of our citizens who are not here legally, if we are sure that they are our citizens, we have always been, you know, open to their legitimate return to India.” He said it is a position India takes with every country.
Analysts see India’s proactive stand on facilitating the return of illegal Indian migrants in the U.S. as a move to address a key concern of the Trump administration as New Delhi prepares to navigate more complicated issues, including trade and tariffs, diplomatic observers said.
“Among a range of issues, where there are divergences between India and the U.S., this is one area where India can show it is transparently doing something, allowing it greater space to manoeuvre in other areas,” according to Harsh Pant, vice president of studies at the Observer Research Foundation in New Delhi. “In other areas, such as the economy and trade, it is very difficult to do things which the new Trump administration may want India to do, and it would take time.”
The United States has identified some 18,000 undocumented Indian migrants to be sent back home, for which India will verify and start the process of deportation, Bloomberg reported earlier this week, citing people familiar with the matter.
Deportations of Indians in the United States who lack proper documentation have been taking place – a group of Indian nationals was repatriated by the U.S. in October, for example. The Indian foreign minister Jaishankar also spoke in support of legal migration channels.
“As a government, we are obviously very much supportive of legal mobility because we do believe in a global workplace. We want Indian talent and Indian skills to have the maximum opportunity at the global level,” he said at his press conference.
The H-1B visa program, which brings skilled foreign workers to the United States, has been a subject of debate in the U.S. in recent years, with some strongly criticizing the program for negatively impacting American workers. Proponents assert those skilled workers benefit U.S. companies and employers. Indians, most of them professionals working in the technology industry, are among the biggest beneficiaries of the visa program.
India is on a “stronger wicket” where H-1B visas are concerned. “On this issue, India has also been getting support from companies in the U.S. So politically, that is a safer issue for India to handle because there is a domestic support base for India,” according to analysts.
Elon Musk is among those who have expressed strong support for the program. Trump, who had been critical of the program, last month spoke in its favour
Who is being deported from the US? How many Indians will be affected?
The Trump administration is targeting undocumented or illegal migrants in the country. According to the New York Times, the military planes to Latin America so far have carried people apprehended under the previous Joe Biden administration.
At least 20,407 “undocumented” Indians could be on the Trump administration’s radar. Of these, 17,940 “paperless” Indians were under “final removal orders”, and another 2,467 are in detention under the Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO) of the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency.
Citing official sources, CNBC reported that as many as 200 undocumented migrants were on the C-17 military aircraft flying to India.
Mr Modi would also be seeking greater access to American technologies in AI, raw materials supply in semiconductors or setting up semiconductor facilities in India with US MNCs like Nvidia, the biggest maker of chips, and exporter. India would also seek to bolster its defence with the latest defence equipment such as high-quality surveillance equipment including high tech drones even as it makes efforts to make its own brands.
US is the biggest trading partner of India with figures touching $118 billion in FY 2023-24 and both Biden and Trump had vowed to take it beyond the $250 billion mark by 2030 during their regimes in the presidencies.
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