The David Cameron government's new immigration rules will adversely affect several Indian professionals.

The new regulations include tighter rules for students, limits on skilled professionals and restrictions on the settlement of migrants already in Britain, that will cause considerable problems for NRIs and other non-EU professionals.

NRIs already in Britain will face retrospective changes to their visa status, including a higher level of salary necessary for their continuing stay, and the stipulation that an applicant for settlement should be free of any convictions, including fines for driving offences.

The HSMP Forum, a campaign group espousing the cause of Indian and other non-EU migrants wrote to immigration minister Damian Green earlier, urging him to rethink the proposed changes, stating that the changes were announced even though the government's own Migration Advisory Committee was reluctant to suggest retrospective changes for migrants already in the UK.

[ Back to Top ]

According to Eduardo Faleiro, commissioner of Goa, visa procedures for Goan NRIs, particularly those settled in Pakistan in pre-partition time, has become easier.

The simplified visa procedures have been designed for persons of Indian origin living in countries like Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, China, Nigeria and Somalia.

Faleiro said several thousand Goans who migrated to Pakistan in pre-partition days and later migrated to Europe or America faced hassles getting visas to India because they were officially know as persons of Pakistani origin, despite having their roots in Goa.

[ Back to Top ]

Deserted NRI brides aka 'Nowhere Brides' number some 30,000 in Punjab. They are the hopeful brides who after the matrimonial ceremonial glitz and glamour have been left by their husbands.
These women have been trapped in fraudulent marriages with NRIs, who for dowry, or parental pressures, faked their vows and left behind women who might as well be widows.

A seminar organised by the National Commission for Women recently called upon the Centre to constitute a new legislation on such marriages so legal remedies are in place for the deserted brides, including demands that NRIs with Indian passports be made accountable under a special law.

One lawyer stated that in the absence of an adequate legal framework and awareness to protect the interests of the brides, the numbers of desertions and high-end divorces will continue to rise.

The Commission is also pushing for India to exercise its rights under the Hague Convention of 1968 that clarifies that nations were not bound by judgments taken in other countries, especially if they ran contrary to their own laws.

[ Back to Top ]

Vipul Shah, a manager at a private share trading firm sold 30,000 shares of Ashok Avatani of Dubai, without his knowledge.

When Avatani discovered the illegal sale a complaint was made with the crime branch and Atul Choksi was arrested as an accessory to the scam. Shah however remains at large.

Choksi has known Shah since 2008 and when Shah got hold of Avatani's shares of Gujarat Fluorochemicals, he forged documents to dupe Avatani's share broker in Vadodara and obtained the original share certificates. He then teamed up with Choksi and a demat account was opened as well as accounts in two banks.

Choksi then sold Avatani's 30,000 shares for Rs.64.88 lakh, credited the money in the banks and later withdrew the money.

The two bank executives have also now been arrested and the search continues for Shah, the lead accused.

[ Back to Top ]

A group of over 500 Indian workers, trafficked to the US from India to work in shipyards after Hurricane Katrina in 2005, have sued Signal International and its co-conspirators for human trafficking and racketeering.

The workers who were allowed into the US on the federal government's H-2B worker visa programme, were allegedly lured with dishonest assurances of becoming lawful permanent US residents. They were subjected to squalid living conditions in Signal's guarded, over crowded labour camps, subjected to psychological abuse and defrauded of adequate payment for their work.

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) joined a class action lawsuit brought on behalf of the workers, stating the federal government has fallen short of its responsibility to protect the rights of guest workers in the country. The workers have also testified before the UN special representative, and senior staff at the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights.

Signal International is a marine and fabrication company with shipyards in Mississippi, Texas and Alabama and is a subcontractor for several major multinational companies.

In this case, if class status is granted this lawsuit could be the largest human trafficking case in US history, according to the ACLU.

[ Back to Top ]