‘Brain drain to brain gain,’ former UN representative explains how India can benefit from H1-B visa fee hike

In an effort to crack down on immigration, US President Donald Trump last week signed a proclamation raising the fee for H-1B visas to a whopping $100,000. While the move is expected to significantly impact Indian technology workers and others on H-1B visas, India's former permanent representative to the UN, Syed Akbaruddin, on Thursday underscored that the situation is both a challenge and an opportunity.

“Every challenge provides opportunities,” Syed Akbaruddin pointed out while speaking about the H-1B visa fee hike. “If America is hesitating to take talent, Bengaluru should take it or Canada will take it. Talent will go where opportunity is,” he observed.

While speaking to ANI, Akbaruddin said, “...H-1B was a bridge between the US and India. However, today it's not seen as a ladder but as a loophole...Taxing talent is a race we will both lose. Partners don't choke talent, they actually channelise talent. A $100,000 toll on a bridge of talent will hurt both sides of that bridge...We need to handle the dreams of young people very carefully. If tariff is tax on goods, this toll on H-1B is a tax on trust...”

“Previously, we used to call it brain drain; now we can look at it as brain gain...Global capability centres can become India's H-1B visa because if you do not allow talent to go out, then work will come inside and talent will migrate here. So, we need to look at it not as a loss but as a need to recalibrate,” he noted.

Akbaruddin addressed concerns that the overhaul could scuttle high-end Indian employment in the US, emphasising the programme's role in bridging differences.

"Thousands of young Indians who have bridged the difference between India and the US have benefited, and so has US society. That it's not a situation that should have come about," he stated.

President Trump, on September 19, signed the executive order to impose a $100,000 fee on H-1B visa applications. According to the proclamation, there will now be a USD 100,000 fee for new H-1B visa applications, a sharp increase from the previous level of about USD 1,500.

According to the US State Department, the new fee requirement applies only to individuals or companies filing new H-1B petitions or entering the lottery system after September 21. Current visa holders and petitions submitted before that date remain unaffected. Under the proclamation, a USD 100,000 payment must accompany every new H-1B visa petition filed after the deadline, including entries in the 2026 lottery.

The announcement triggered immediate chaos in the United States: Silicon Valley companies warned employees against travelling abroad, foreign workers rushed to book return flights, and immigration lawyers worked overtime to decode the order.

While Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick on September 19 said the fee would be paid annually, the White House on September 20 clarified that it would apply only to new applications and would be a one-time charge.