NRI PULSE STAFF REPORT
Houston, Texas, August 2, 2024: A scam involving the United States’ highly coveted H-1B visa lottery has recently come to light, with Indian American leader Kandi Srinivasa Reddy, based in Texas, being implicated in the controversy. Reddy, who has ties to the Congress party in Telangana, is accused of exploiting the H-1B visa system, which allows U.S. employers to hire foreign workers in specialized fields, to fraudulently obtain visas.
H-1B Visa Lottery Scam Uncovered
According to an investigation conducted by Bloomberg, the H-1B visa lottery system, designed to randomly allocate work visas, has been manipulated by certain outsourcing and staffing firms. The investigation revealed that these firms submitted multiple entries for the same worker, thereby increasing their chances of winning the visa lottery.
In the most recent year, out of 446,000 applicants, only 85,000 were successful in obtaining the H-1B visa. It was found that multinational outsourcing companies secured 11,600 visas, while IT staffing firms obtained 22,600. Alarmingly, about 15,500 of these visas were allegedly acquired through fraudulent means.
The report highlighted how one staffing firm operator used a dozen different companies to enter the same individual multiple times, ultimately securing hundreds of H-1B visas. This practice has drawn sharp criticism as it allows certain firms to monopolize the visa allocation, leaving other businesses and qualified immigrants at a disadvantage.
Kandi Srinivasa Reddy’s Involvement
Kandi Srinivasa Reddy, who has a background in technology and holds a master’s degree from the United States, founded Cloud Big Data Technologies LLC in 2013. Based in Texas, Reddy also maintains a public image as a philanthropist, supporting farmers in India through his foundation. However, Bloomberg’s investigation indicates that Reddy’s company, Cloud Big Data, submitted over 280 entries for employees in the 2020 H-1B lottery. Additionally, a dozen other companies controlled by Reddy, many of which had similar names and shared email addresses, also submitted multiple entries. As a result, his companies allegedly won more than 300 H-1B visas since 2020.
Once the visas were secured, Reddy’s company reportedly leased these workers to major corporations like Meta Platforms Inc. and HSBC Holdings Plc. Cloud Big Data is said to have taken a significant portion of the workers’ pay, up to 30%, amounting to $15,000 or more annually per worker.
Reddy’s Response
In response to the allegations, Kandi Srinivasa Reddy has denied any wrongdoing. In a phone interview with Bloomberg, he stated that he is merely a “registered agent” for the companies and has minimal involvement in their operations. However, official records in Texas list him as the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Cloud Big Data.
Reddy’s election affidavit in India also reveals that he and his wife control the companies in question. Despite these findings, Reddy maintains that his actions were within legal boundaries and attributes the multiple visa entries to the choices of the employees involved.
USCIS Response
In light of these revelations, the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) has implemented new rules for the H-1B visa lottery system to prevent multiple registrations. Reddy’s lawyer, Lucas Garritson, acknowledged that the USCIS had scrutinized the visas obtained by several companies but argued that the authorities have not taken decisive action to prevent such abuses, nor have they proven that Reddy’s companies violated any rules.