IITians Aren’t Getting The Highest Number Of H-1B Visas, Students Of These Universities Are

If you are someone who cannot flaunt an IIT-IIM-BITS badge, and thinks that you might have a hard time fetching the coveted US H-1B visa, don’t lose hope. 

A ridiculous amount of Indian students flock to the US every year in search of a better future and better career opportunities. And to be honest, why shouldn’t they? 

But you’d be shocked to know that extrapolation of this data is nowhere close to the common belief. Most of us think that students of IITs/IIMs/BITS are the ones who hold the most number of H-1B visas. But, that’s actually not true.

In 2017, the US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) issued 85,000 H-1B visas and out of these, over 20,000 went to Indians, reveals Quartz, from the data obtained by Foreign Labour Certification. 

Much to our surprise, it isn’t IIT Delhi or IIT Mumbai, but the students from Anna University, Chennai who topped the list. As many as 850 students from the said institute obtained the H-1B. This was closely followed by Hyderabad’s Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University (JNTU) with over 747 students. 

IIT and BITS stood at the lowly 60, each. 

You must also know that IIT holds only 6% of the total strength of Anna University. In total, IIT offers as many as 12,000 seats a year, as opposed to Anna, where 200,000 students are enrolled. Since the H-1Bs are allocated via lottery, it makes sense for Anna to fetch more spots than IIT. 

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Indians make up for the second largest international student population in the US and looks like a couple of universities have a lot to do with that.