No violations found by US in Infosys H1-B visa case September 08, 2015 17:43
Infosys, second largest software services company of India, has announced that the government of the US found no violations in H1-B visa case. A probe began concerning the H1-B visa case in June 2015. The company said in a statement that, “Infosys is pleased to report that the US Department of Labor (DOL) concluded its investigation with a determination of compliance regarding labour condition applications filed in the Southern California Edison project.” In DOL investigation in which more than 145 files were reviewed, Infosys cooperated totally and no violations were detected. Earlier in June, investigations began by the US on Infosys as well as its arch rival Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) for possible violations of rules of H-1B visa. However, TCS has not responded yet on the matter. H-1B visa - non-immigrant visa A non-immigrant visa, H-1B visa is mostly used by information technology (IT) companies to employ foreign workers on temporary basis in their US offices in specialty occupations. Biggest recipients of H-1B visas are Indian IT firms. Sandeep Dadlani Infosys EVP and Head of Americas said, “IT services companies like Infosys provide superior service, skill and scope from global centres of excellence, bringing value and technology innovations to enable American companies to be competitive and succeed.” “We do not practice or condone unfair or unethical H-1B visa practices. Our key priority is to operate fairly, ethically and with integrity, which is good business and what our clients expect,” Mr. Dadlani said. -Sumana
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Amazon, University of Pennsylvania sued over suicide of Indian-origin student September 07, 2015 14:47
Mother of a 20-year-old Indian-origin student, Arya Singh, who committed suicide in 2013, has sued the online giant Amazon and the University of Pennsylvania over her death. The nursing student committed suicide after consuming cyanide purchased from the online retailer, according to media reports. In 2011, the 20-year-old nursing student of the University reported an alleged sexual assault by a male student for which no charges were filed and he remained in the campus. According to lawsuit, this could have resulted in a two-year downward spiral that concluded with her cyanide suicide. After complaining on the male student for sexual assault, she put up troubling behavior at school like missing classes and even getting detained for alcohol intoxication, reported the Philadelphia Inquirer. The suit said, “Despite her problems, university employees’ conduct toward her was unsympathetic, hostile, and at times vindictive.” It was alleged that one official of the school wrote in an email that she had “no sympathy” for her and the 20-year-old “deserves anything you dish out to her.” Cyanide crystals from Amazon In December 2012, the nursing student has order for cyanide crystals through a Thailand vendor from Amazon. Cyanide was listed as a “kitchen” item. The vendor and his company were named as defendants in the suit filed in late July. The girl was investigated for academic misconduct by the spring 2013 semester, during which she was excluded from registering for classes and was ordered to leave dorm as they wait for a hearing on the academic misconduct. On the day of the hearing, 8 February 2013, the girl was found unresponsive by her roommate in the dorm. Few hours later, she was pronounced dead. Until 2 February 2013, cyanide was offered for sale by Amazon. That means till few days before the death of the nursing student. The US bought the poison more than 50 times and minimum 11 people died of it along with the nursing student, said the suit. According report from the New York Daily News, Amazon has not returned requests for comment. -Sumana
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Bollywood Themed Indian Restaurant In Britain By NRI September 04, 2015 15:26
An Indian-origin chef has opened an Indian restaurant named ‘Papadoms’ with Bollywood theme in Britain. The chef was actually inspired by India’s road side dhabas that dot the national highways. Offering Indian street food, the Bollywood themed Papadoms restaurant is located at High Street West complex in Sunderland city, reported Sunderland Echo news portal. Sanjeev Sanghara, executive chef and owner of Papadoms restaurant said that Sunderland was the perfect place for the restaurant creating a minimum of 30 part-time jobs in the Sunderland city. Sanghara also said that he plans to unveil a chain of Papadoms restaurants in the near future. The chef also noted that there is a huge opportunity and many chances to introduce novel style of cuisine to Sunderland. Sanghara was quoted as saying that, “Most of the menu which also features handi and tiffin options is inspired by a trip to India.” "We launched the Papadoms pilot here to test new ideas in the market. There is a lot of competition from other Indian restaurants at this site,” Sanghara added. The chef’s family owns two Indian restaurants that are traditional in Scotland. -Sumana
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Gunman fires at Billu’s Indian Eatery in Sydney August 26, 2015 13:04
On Tuesday, just before 9 p.m. local time a gunman fired a shot at a crowded Indian restaurant through the front window at Harris Park in Sydney’s west, marking the second such incident in the area in last four months. During the time of firing, 30 to 40 members of staff and customers were inside the Billu’s Indian Eatery on Wigram Street. Local police revealed that none were injured as the bullet traveled through the restaurant’s front window hitting a shelf. Soon after the incident, blue track suited gunman was seen running south on Wigram Street. Police said, “Just before 9 p.m., a single shot was fired into the Indian restaurant on Wigram Street, Harris Park.” They are now seeking assistance from someone who could have seen the man particularly a women who was knocked down onto the ground near the pedestrian crossing on the Wigram Street. The incident of firing shots by a gunman happened for the second time this year in the area that marks a hub of Indian restaurants besides Indian shops. Yadu Singh, Sydney-based cardiologist, said, the incident has generated a great concern among the Indian businesses in the area. It is scary and police is probing the incident.” -Sumana
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IT Initiative Of NRIs To Help Andhra Pradesh August 20, 2015 11:11
IT initiative by an NRI group has been unveiled by N Chandrababu Naidu, Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh, to help the state in several areas using mobile apps and other technology apps. The non-profit organization, 'Code for AP', in the US supports AP in e-governance, economic and social development. A total of 100 volunteers are working with the organization that aligns with 30 government departments. Technology-based solutions will be offered to the departments to streamline work. Different state government projects including 'Central Fund Monitoring Portal', 'Mobile Device Management', 'Sentry Gate' and 'News Room' have been worked by Code for AP. First of its kind app, the 'Central Fund Monitoring Portal’ will facilitate every department to thoroughly understand each and every scheme launched by the Union government. Government officials on field work are sanctioned tablets and smart phones under the 'Mobile Device Management', facilitating data collection.The security department was empowered thorough an advanced automation system, the Sentry Gate Pass system, that allows access for a visitor into state Secretariat using a smart tab. A free Android application, News Room, allows users from anywhere in the world to access leading Indian newspapers in Telugu and English.Naidu said "During Pushkaram, our government has worked on getting crowd feedback through IVRS system. That worked well. We now want Code for AP to work on applications that will not only support the government, but also come up with innovative ideas for delivering citizen services.” -Sumana
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Proposal To Lift Minimum Wage For H-1B Visas: Donald Trump August 19, 2015 15:05
Donald Trump, Republican presidential front runner, has proposed to lift the minimum wage for H-1B visas, sounding the death knell for the most popular work visas particularly for the Indian technology professionals. This came with the releases of his policy to put American workers first.According to Trump, such move would allow companies to offer IT jobs to unemployed Americans rather than cheaper overseas workers.The real-estate tycoon who is based from the New York lashed out at Mark Zuckerberg, founder of Facebook, and Marco Rubio, Florida Senator, for introducing a bill to increase H-1B visas three times more. Currently, the H-1B visas are capped every year to 65,000 each annum by the U.S. Congress.A position paper on immigration reform released by the Trump Campaign said, “Increase prevailing wage for H-1Bs.” This came as an opposition to Zuckerberg’s move to increase H-1B visa number.The position paper said, “We graduate two times more Americans with STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) degrees each year than find STEM jobs, yet as much as two-thirds of entry-level hiring for IT jobs is accomplished through the H-1B program.”“Raising the prevailing wage paid to H-1Bs will force companies to give these coveted entry-level jobs to the existing domestic pool of unemployed native and immigrant workers in the U.S., instead of flying in cheaper workers from overseas,” it added.Also Read: Around 200 Indians not paid for five months in oman -Sumana
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Around 200 Indians Not Paid For Five Months In Oman August 13, 2015 17:37
Around 200 Indians working with a construction company based in Oman are not being paid for past five months, according to a recent media report.The workers were quoted by TOI as saying that, "Our salaries are pending for the past five months. We were waiting for the company to pay us, but they have failed to keep their promise. It has become quite difficult to survive.” A complaint was lodged by the workers to get their dues, with the Indian embassy.The workers said, "We have lodged a complaint with the Indian embassy on August 10. We are ready to leave but we need to be paid for our work. We cannot leave empty-handed.”According to workers, the company is not willing to clear their dues and is asking them to leave. The company has project sites in Ibri, Mabelah, Nakhal and Bausher. The company did not make a comment over the workers' claims.A Muscat-based legal advisor was quoted by TOI as saying that, "The Oman government and the labour law guarantee a salary for the workers according to the signed job contract agreed upon at the time of employment. So, if there is any violation in that the workers have the right to approach the labour department.”-Sumana
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NRIs Can Now Enroll For Aadhar August 07, 2015 18:16
Government has decided that Aadhaar enrolment can be made by Non-Resident Indians, Persons of Indian Origin and Overseas Citizen of India which should eventually help them to authenticate their identity digitally, Parliament was informed.“The government has decided that a longer term goal should be to expand Aadhaar enrolment activities in order to ensure that all persons on the Indian soil (Resident Indian, NRIs, OCI/PIO and visa holding visitors) shall be empowered with a unique identity / identifier that can be authenticated on a digital platform any time anywhere,” Planning Minister Rao Inderjit Singh said in written reply to Lok Sabha.All residents including Indian national and foreigners with valid visas can be enrolled and provided Aadhaar number by the UIDAI. UIDAI is working on the policy for Aadhaar enrolment of the NRIs, PIOs and OICs after receiving the direction from the government on the issue. The minister has said in its reply that no timeframe has been formulated at this stage for achieving the goal.Aadhaar is a valid know your customer (KYC) document for various services including banking, telecom, cooking gas subsidy, vehicle registration driving licence, government scholarships, pension and public distribution system..By Premji
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NRIs Can Invest In National Pension System For Social Security Cover July 25, 2015 09:34
Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority (PFRDA) India Chairman, Hemant Contractor said that Non-resident Indians (NRIs) can invest in National Pension System (NPS) to obtain a social security cover. PFRDA was communicated by RBI about NRIs being eligible to make such investments. The clarification that effect Foreign Exchange Management Act (FEMA) guidelines to facilitate the investment by NRI’s in NPS will be out shortly.Contractor said that, "There was some ambiguity about whether to add NPS as eligible investment by NRI. So, we took up the matter with RBI and recently they have given this clarification that NPS like insurance and mutual fund could also be eligible investment for NRIs."Importance of NPS scheme for NRIsAccording to Contractor, NRIs living in the Middle-East does not have mandatory social security benefit. Through this window, Non-resident Indians can save money for their old age besides enjoying the tax break as prescribed.Talks between the Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority (PFRDA) and bankers like SBI, HDFC Bank, Canara Bank, Indian Bank and several other south India-based banks are going on, to tap potential of NRIs."We have started talking to bankers about attracting NRIs to enroll for NPS scheme. We see NRIs as very attractive market for NPS. We would like to push for NPS for the NRIs," Contractor said.The move could increase the subscriber base in addition to the expansion of the pension corpus in the private sector. Currently, corpus under the National Pension System is Rs 91,000 crore.-Sumana
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Supreme Court extends time for NRI e-voting rights July 10, 2015 10:54
The Supreme Court has extended two months more time to the Centre to finish the necessary formalities and arrangements of a legislation seeking to grant right to vote for non-resident Indians (NRI). This would allow e-voting by NRIs and they will not have to fly to their hometowns during elections.A three-judge bench, comprising Chief Justice H L Dattu and Justices Amitava Roy and Arun Kumar Mishra, granted the time.Earlier in April, the apex court granted the Centre a time period of eight weeks to work out the modalities and other features to facilitate proxy voting and e-ballots for NRIs during elections.The apex court, in its January 12 interim order, had said that the e-voting should be implemented at the earliest, to enable around 11 million NRIs worldwide to cast their vote. Voters residing abroad will receive blank postal ballot papers through e-mails. NRIs have to fill them and e-mail to their respective constituency. According to the Election Commission, e-voting has a minimum risk of rigging, manipulation or violation of secrecy in this system. The government allowed the NRIs to vote in 2010, but as per the rules they were expected in their constituency on the day of voting.-Sumana
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Infosys to rely less on US H-1B visa for US facilities July 09, 2015 11:55
Infosys, an Indian IT company, has announced that it will be less reliant on US H-1B visa for its US facilities. Infosys CEO, Vishal Sikka, hopes that the less dependence on the H-1B visa and employment of more local workers will help the company to attain its goal to reach $20 billion revenue by 2020.In response to reports that Infosys was under investigation for misuse of H-1B visas by the US Department of Labor, Sikka was quoted by workpermit as saying that, "We should not be concerned about the H-1B visa issue, I'm an American citizen. Our compliance to H-1B regulations is impregnable and we take our responsibilities extremely seriously along with the countless other companies across our industry sector that do so. However, as the power of innovation increases, we're at a point where we have to become far less dependent on visas and increasingly dependent on innovation."Earlier, US senators Dick Durbin, a Democrat from Illinois, and Senator Jeff Sessions, a Republican from Alabama, made claims of H-1B visa misuse. According to the senators, Infosys has violated H-1B visa rules. Yet there has been no confirmation from the Department of Labor that there is an investigation into H-1B visa misuse by the company.-Sumana
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U.S. back in Visa Business after Major Outage June 24, 2015 12:27
U.S. Department of State is back in the business of issuing visas after the online system abruptly stopped working at consulates worldwide earlier this month. About two thirds of visa issuance facilities are back online and have been issued visas although only 45,000 were handed out on Monday. Of those, 15,000 were issued in Beijing, which is the busiest U.S. consulate in the world. "Significant additional numbers will be issued as the backlog clears," State Department Spokesman John Kirby said. "Many posts have now rescheduled interviews, in many cases as early as the 24th", he added. "Significant additional numbers will be issued as the backlog clears," he said. "Many posts have now rescheduled interviews, in many cases as early as the 24th", he quipped. "So far, it's going well," Kirby ended. The State Department hasn't provided details on what went wrong and why it took so long to fix, beyond saying the database needed to be rebuilt. The department said the failure was related to a hardware device and was not the result of a cyber attack. The same database failed at about the same time last year, throwing summer travel plans in chaos for around 200,000 people. On that occasion, a bug-ridden software patch from Oracle and Microsoft caused the problem. Kirby cautioned that the system was still being tested and as such could still be taken offline again. Throughout the outage, which also affected issuance of U.S. passports at missions overseas, the U.S. has been handled a small number of visa cases. It has issued around 1,250 visas to temporary or seasonal workers from Mexico whose biometric details were already in the system and it has handed out around 3,000 visas related to urgent or humanitarian purposes. The system failure was second of its kind in the recent times. It throws the summer plans of almost 2, 00,000 passengers in chaos, when it failed last summer. - Manohar. M
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