Meghna Gupta* had carefully mapped out her future. She wanted to complete her master’s degree by the age of 23, work in India for a few years, and then move to the United States before turning 30 to eventually settle there.

 

She put in long hours at Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) in Hyderabad, one of India’s biggest IT firms and a key driver of the country’s outsourcing growth. Her hope was that a promotion would eventually take her to the US West Coast.

 

Now, at 29, those dreams appear shattered. The administration of US President Donald Trump has transformed the H-1B visa system, which technology companies have relied upon for decades to bring skilled talent into the country.

 

Trump’s government has raised the visa fee from around $2,000 to nearly $100,000 in many cases. This drastically increases the minimum cost for companies sponsoring an H-1B worker. While the base salary requirement is $60,000, employers now face a total expense of about $160,000 per worker. For several firms, that makes hiring Americans at lower wages more feasible than sponsoring foreign staff.

 

This policy shift fits into Trump’s broader push for US companies to hire domestically while tightening immigration rules. But for thousands of young professionals worldwide, especially in India, it is a major blow.

 

For decades, Indian IT firms were among the largest sponsors of H-1B visas, using them to send staff to the US and outsource their expertise. In 2014, seven of the ten companies with the most H-1B approvals were Indian or India-based. By 2024, that number dropped to four. In the first half of 2025, TCS was the only Indian firm in the top ten, a list otherwise dominated by American tech giants such as Amazon, Microsoft, Meta, and Apple.

 

Despite this shift, the majority of H-1B visas continued to go to Indians. In 2024, over 70 percent of approvals were for Indian nationals, compared with less than 12 percent for Chinese professionals, the next largest group.

 

Now, many in India fear that this pathway is closing. “It has left me devastated,” Gupta said, describing how the fee hike derailed her lifelong dream of building a life in the US. Born in the small Uttarakhand town of Bageshwar, she explained, “Every decision I made was aimed at eventually moving to America. The so-called American Dream feels like a cruel joke now.”

 

Her story reflects a larger contradiction in India’s growth story. The country is celebrated by its leaders as the world’s fastest-growing major economy. Earlier this year, India overtook Japan to become the fourth-largest economy globally, behind only the US, China, and Germany. Yet job creation has not kept pace with the expanding workforce, leaving many young Indians searching abroad for opportunities.

 

India’s cities struggle with congested roads, inadequate infrastructure, and widening income inequality. For millions, migration remains the most attractive option. Many pursue careers in engineering or medicine with the goal of securing opportunities abroad. In the last five years, the number of Indians leaving for developed nations has surged. Government data shows that the migration of skilled professionals jumped from 94,145 in 2020 to 348,629 in 2024 — an increase of 270 percent.

 

Trump’s new visa regime could sharply cut the flow of Indian workers into the US. The decision follows other trade tensions between Washington and New Delhi, including steep tariffs on Indian exports and disputes linked to India’s purchases of Russian oil.

 

Ajay Srivastava, former Indian trade official and head of the Global Trade Research Initiative (GTRI), said the most vulnerable sectors will be those where Indian professionals dominate. “Jobs in IT services, software development, project management, finance, and healthcare back-end support will face the biggest hit,” he explained.