Interesting to watch the MAGA civil war going on in America! Just remember, either way India wins! Suppose the lottery is to go and with no cap on H1B, there can be no stopping meritorious Indians. Many are now turning to Australia, Canada, Germany and the UK. From Sundar Pichchai to Satya Nadella and Indra Nooyi, Indians benefited from the pre-lottery system. The cap on H1B proved to be a dampener but on hindsight its been good for Indian nation as it acts like a stopper to incessant braindrain from India that is harming our country. Meanwhile Indian ethnic population constitutes about 1% of total American but contributes to 6% of the American GDP. A very literate and forward community, its not a surprise that Indian origin people are doing well not only in the US but also in UK, Australia wherever. Even in Middle East, the NRIs (Non Resident Indians) win hands down topping all other nationalities put together. Indian diaspora in general is one successful and upbeat community doing India proud. If you ask me the reason, I can cite only a couple from my own observation: Discipline chiefly, traditional family life with preserved values, and keeping out of controversies not wanting to get embroiled in trouble, choosing academics/economic development/arts and crafts/family life to fast life/vices. Nothing really special and very much the ordinary. But I do also see on other side how some nationalities ‘live it up’ once they can lay their hands on money.
The talk is about H1B. How about sending the Indian doctors home?? India can do well with that move really. You know what it takes to produce a single efficient doctor in a third world nation like India? Do you know the cost we shell out to produce an IIT graduate/IIM graduate. Ask Indra Nooyi and Sundar Pichai. These are exactly the kind of people who bled our nation raw and then chose to give back nothing to motherland. And here these guys now debate on H1B. Who do you think will be the loser if you cap H1B? Who do you think will stand to gain if you turn our kids back from America? That guy Sriram Krishnan from SRM, Chennai – what do you think made him what he is today.
These Americans have nothing to say about the mother country that loses Her sons and daughters to utterly materialistic societies with no concern for humanity or social welfare. Its painful at times to think of what India is losing big time.
On the other hand, it can also make a mother happy to see her children prosperous and living a life of dignity and success.
How many thousands of old and aged parents back in India living a lonely life. They save every penny sleeping on thin mattresses, eating humble meals, forgoing holidays, cutting back on comforts and luxuries, living in cramped homes so that their children can have a better education and better future. Have you seen Pichai’s house that was sold by his father recently? Just 2-3 km from my home. Do you know what it takes to send an Indian kid to the US for MS/Phd. More than the tuition fees paid through bank loans on pledging your home, it takes a heavy heart on the part of the parents to see off their kids in the airport flying thousands and thousands of miles away across oceans. Mothers bleed from their hearts. Fathers don’t know what to do with their sparse savings and investments on retirement and the small house they worked for a lifetime to build. Visits to America become rarer with age. Home is EMPTY. At first the children visit home/India annually. Then slowly the visits stop. How many old people die alone in India with their children living in luxury villas in the Bay Area or wherever. Father dies, mother dies – and then go into freezer box until the son arrives from America for cremation. This is what India is giving America. This is the sacrifice of Indian parents behind every H1B that is issued by the US. If America can turn down some Indian kids, they will be doing a big favour to their poor Indian parents.
STEM also includes the medical aspirants. Curiously America never talks about sending back Indian doctors or cutting their quotas. Medicos from India receive red carpet welcome wherever they go. Easily our Indian doctors outclass others as we observe in foreign countries. The medicos are the hardest to create, cultivate/train. They are the priciest.
In spite of giving so much to America, India is still preparing to take on the world with the second line of defence. So long as our own children don’t turn against us with their policies and politics, its fine.
To most of us who have our children in the US, US also feels like home. Especially me, I am a resident of three countries India, Qatar and America (visiting), that borders blur for me nowadays. When you live half your life outside your country, it becomes increasingly less and less important to alienate between nations, people, culture, languages and faith. Its this point I am reaching in life.
vijiravindran's 