US allocates additional 250K visa slots for Indian travellers
The move comes at a time when more than 1.2 million Indians have travelled to the US so far during 2024, a 35% increase over the same period in 2023, the US embassy said
The US said on Monday it has allocated an additional 250,000 visa appointments for Indian travellers, including tourists, skilled workers and students, in order to meet the growing demand for visas.
The move comes at a time when more than 1.2 million Indians have travelled to the US so far during 2024, a 35% increase over the same period in 2023, the US embassy said in a statement. At least six million Indians have a non-immigrant visa to visit the US and the mission issues thousands more each day, it said.
“The recently released new slots will help hundreds of thousands of Indian applicants take timely interviews, facilitating the travel which is the backbone of the people-to-people ties that underpin the US-India relationship,” the statement said.
The US mission to India has already surpassed one million non-immigrant visa applications for the second consecutive year. “During our student visa season this summer, we continued to process record numbers, and all first-time student applicants were able to obtain an appointment at one of our five consular sections around India,” the statement said.
“We are now focused on bringing families together, connecting businesses, and facilitating tourism,” it added.
The statement quoted US ambassador Eric Garcetti as saying: “Prime Minister Narendra Modi and President Joe Biden set an ambitious goal to improve and expedite the visa process and I’m proud to say that we have delivered on that promise. Our consular teams at the embassy and four consulates work tirelessly to ensure that we meet the surging demand.”
Indians accounted for almost a quarter of the 600,000 student visas issued by the US from October 2022 to September 2023, according to figures released earlier by the American side. The US has also taken steps to address delays and backlogs in visa applications that were brought on by the Covid-19 pandemic.
The US processed more visas in India than ever before during 2023, cutting the wait time for visitor visa appointments by 75%. Over the past year, the US embassy and consulates in India processed 1.4 million visas. Indians now represent one out of every 10 US visa applicants across the world, with a 60% increase in applications for all types of visas in 2023, when compared to the figures for 2022.
Earlier this year, the US embassy said the appointment wait time for visitor visas were brought down from an average of 1,000 days to 250 days across India through process improvements and investments in staffing.