“The long-running scam of cousin hiring and pay-for-job schemes in India’s IT pipeline to America is finally over.”
Washington/New Delhi (23/09/2025)- The Trump administration’s move to impose a staggering $100,000 annual fee on H-1B visas has sent shockwaves through India’s IT sector and triggered a sharp reaction from the Indian government.
For decades, Indian IT professionals have dominated America’s H-1B program, which was originally intended to fill genuine gaps in the U.S. workforce. Instead, critics argue it became a pipeline for cheap, repetitive labor from India — largely low-level IT clerks performing routine tasks that could easily be handled by American workers, or now replaced altogether by artificial intelligence.
A System Long Abused
U.S. tech companies often claimed they “could not find skilled workers,” but insiders admit the reality was about cutting costs. By recruiting from India, companies avoided paying competitive American salaries. Over time, Indian hires filled entire departments, and hiring patterns became heavily skewed.
Worse, reports have emerged of nepotism and corruption within the system. Many hiring managers of Indian origin were accused of giving preference to their relatives, friends, and even selling jobs through middlemen in India. Agents in Indian cities acted as brokers, charging hopeful applicants huge sums in exchange for a U.S. placement — money that insulated companies from legal exposure under American law. For workers, it was still worth it: silence was guaranteed in exchange for the prized “America job.”
India’s ‘No-Brain Drain’
Supporters in India often touted this migration as “brain drain,” but critics argue it was anything but. “If these so-called IT experts couldn’t innovate or build successful industries at home, what makes anyone believe they would transform America?” said one U.S. policy analyst. The reality, they claim, is that the U.S. imported low-cost clerical labor under the guise of tech talent.
Indian Government Pushback
India’s government has condemned the Trump administration’s new fees as discriminatory and harmful to global competitiveness. Officials in New Delhi are scrambling to lobby Washington, warning of damage to U.S.-India relations. Yet within India itself, debate is intensifying: was the H-1B pipeline really a success story, or just a decades-long scam that benefited middlemen, outsourcing giants, and multinational corporations seeking profit margins at the expense of American workers?
The Road Ahead
For Indian IT workers dreaming of Silicon Valley, the $100,000 barrier may be insurmountable. For U.S. tech companies, it forces a reckoning: hire locally at fair wages or accelerate automation through AI. For India, it exposes an uncomfortable truth — exporting clerks is not the same as exporting innovation.
Trump’s move, though controversial, may mark the end of an era where America subsidized India’s IT ambitions. The world is now watching how both nations navigate this turning point in global labor and technology.y.