From H-1B to green cards: Why Indian tech workers are facing a double squeeze in the US

​A young Indian tech worker faces a long and uncertain path toward permanent residency in the US. ​ For years, the H-1B visa was the front door, and the green card was the destination. Indian technology professionals accepted the lottery odds, years in limbo and uncertainty because the pathway, however slow, was open. Now, both ends of that pathway are under pressure.With nearly 10 lakh Indians already in the US employment-based green-card backlog, the journey from temporary worker to permanent resident is becoming a two-sided squeeze: getting in is harder, while getting out of the visa queue can take decades.On September 8, US Department of Labor Inspector General Anthony D'Esposito announced that Cognizant's new PERM filings had been suspended amid an investigation into alleged fraud and misuse of employment-based visa programmes.Days later, he said the same had happened to Cloudera. The department has not publicly disclosed the number of employees affected, the duration of the suspensions or detailed allegations against either company.Rajiv Dabhadkar, founder of the National Organisation for Software and Technology Professionals (NOSTOPS), told TOI,“Cognizant's PERM suspension s...