Several Indians face deportation as ‘Pay to Stay’ visa racket busted in US
Washington, Jan 31: Several foreigners, including from India, face deportation from the US after authorities busted a "pay to stay" visa racket and arrested eight persons on charges of fraudulently facilitating at least 600 immigrants to illegally remain in the country.
In late-night and pre-dawn raids, the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents arrested eight foreigners all of whom are either Indian nationals or Indian Americans for aiding foreign nationals to remain in the United States illegally by actively recruiting them to enrol into a fake university in Farmington Hills in Metro Detroit.
Without the knowledge of the conspirators, the university was operated by special agents of the Homeland Security Investigations (HIS) as part of an undercover operation, from a small building in Detroit area. Information made available on the website of this university in particular those related to admissions leaves a lot of questions.
Simultaneously, the ICE also has started detaining foreign students of this fake university and started the process of their deportation.
"Vast majority" of those arrested and detained are Indian nationals, an ICE official told PTI.
"Special agents from ICE's Homeland Security Investigations arrested eight on criminal charges as part of an investigation into potential abuses of the US student visa system," the official said.
In their late 20s or early 30s, those arrested by the ICE include Barath Kakireddy, Suresh Kandala, Phanideep Karnati, Prem Rampeesa, Santosh Sama, Avinash Thakkallapally, Aswanth Nune, and Naveen Prathipati. Six of them were arrested in Detroit area while the other two in Virginia and Florida.
According to an indictment unsealed in a local court Wednesday, these eight individuals helped at least 600 foreign nationals stay in the US illegally.
"As part of this investigation, numerous foreign nationals face administrative immigration violations. Those individuals will be placed in removal proceedings, and ICE will seek to maintain them in its custody pending the outcome of those proceedings," the ICE official told PTI.
The Indian Embassy here and its consulates are in touch with student organisations and offered help. It is also in touch with US authorities.
According to the indictment, from February 2017 to January 2019, a group of foreign citizens, conspired with each other and others to fraudulently facilitate hundreds of foreign nationals in illegally remaining and working in the US by actively recruiting them to enrol into the university.
The university was part of a federal law enforcement undercover operation designed to identify recruiters and entities engaged in immigration. The university had no staff, no teachers, and conducted no real classes.
As part of the scheme, the indictment said, the defendants and recruiters assisted foreign citizen "students" in fraudulently obtaining immigration documents from the school and facilitated the creation of false student records, including transcripts, for the purpose of deceiving immigration authorities.
The illegal documents obtained as a result of the conspirators' actions were based on false claims, false statements, and fraud since the purported foreign students had no intention of attending school, nor attended a single class, and were not bona fide students, federal prosecutors said.
Noting that all participants in the scheme knew that the school had no instructors or actual classes, the ICE said the defendants intended to help shield and hide their customers "students" from US immigration authorities for money and collectively profited in excess of a quarter of a million dollars as a result of their scheme.
"We are all aware that international students can be a valuable asset to our country, but as this case shows, the well-intended international student visa programme can also be exploited and abused," stated US Attorney Matthew Schneider.
"Homeland Security Investigations special agents uncovered a nationwide network that grossly exploited US immigration laws," said Special Agent Charge Francis.
"Each of the foreign citizen who enrolled and made tuition payments to the university knew that they would not attend accrual classes, earn credits or make progress towards an actual degree in a particular field of study a pay to stay scheme," the indictment said.
"Rather their intent was to fraudulently maintain their student visa status and to obtain work authorisation under the CPT (Curricular Practical Training) programme," it said.
This is the second such case when Department of Homeland Security has used a fake university to unearth a fake student visa racket. In 2016, the ICE had arrested some 21 people for similar charges for a fake University of Northern New Jersey.
Meanwhile, social media chatter on various platform in particular those from Andhra Pradesh and Telangana -- indicated that the ICE raids were carried out in various cities across the US -- Columbus Ohio; Houston in Texas, Atlanta in Georgia, St Louis in Missouri and New York and New Jersey.
In a statement posted on its website Reddy & Neumann group of immigration attorney said that it has received multiple reports that the ICE raided multiple worksites containing CPT students authorised by the University of Farmington, located in Farmington Hills, Michigan.
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Indian mobile hospital treats over 2,200 cyclone-hit people as New Delhi ramps up relief efforts in
Colombo (PTI): A mobile hospital set up by India in Sri Lanka has provided medical care to over 2,200 people affected by Cyclone Ditwah, as New Delhi ramped up its assistance to the flood-ravaged island nation with engineering support and delivery of fresh relief consignments, the Indian mission here said on Sunday.
Sri Lanka has been grappling with widespread flooding, landslides and severe infrastructure collapse triggered by the cyclone, leaving several districts isolated and severely straining the country's disaster-response capacity.
At least 627 people have been killed and 190 remain missing as of Sunday noon due to catastrophic floods and landslides caused by extreme weather conditions since November 16.
Sharing a social media post by the Ministry of External Affairs on its X handle, the Indian High Commission said a field hospital set up by India in Mahiyanganaya near Kandy has provided medical care to more than 2,200 people affected by the cyclone since December 5.
The hospital has also performed 67 minor procedures and three surgeries, it said. The field hospital was airlifted to Sri Lanka by an IAF C-17 aircraft along with a 78-member Indian medical team on Tuesday.
In another post, the mission said Indian Army engineers, working with Sri Lanka Army Engineers and the Road Development Authority, in Kilinochchi have begun removing a damaged bridge on the Paranthan–Karachchi–Mullaitivu (A35) road, a key route disrupted by the cyclone.
"This joint effort marks another step toward restoring vital connectivity for affected communities," it said.
India has additionally sent nearly 1,000 tonnes of food items and clothing contributed by the people of Tamil Nadu. Of these, about 300 tonnes reached Colombo on Sunday morning aboard three Indian Naval ships.
High Commissioner Santosh Jha handed over the supplies to Sri Lankan Minister for Trade, Commerce, Food Security and Cooperative Development Wasantha Samarasinghe.
India, on November 28, launched 'Operation Sagar Bandhu', a Humanitarian Assistance and Disaster Relief (HADR) initiative, to aid Sri Lanka in its recovery from the devastation caused by Cyclone Ditwah.
Since the launch of the operation, India has provided about 58 tonnes of relief material, including dry rations, tents, tarpaulins, hygiene kits, essential cloths, water purification kits and about 4.5 tonnes of medicines and surgical equipment, the Indian mission said in a press release on Sunday.
Another 60 tonnes of equipment, including generators, inflatable rescue boats, Outboard Motors, and excavators, have also been brought to Sri Lanka, it said, adding that 185 tonnes of Bailey Bridge units were airlifted to restore critical connectivity along with 44 engineers.
Two columns of the National Disaster Response Force, comprising 80 experts and K9 units with specially trained dogs, assisted with immediate rescue and relief efforts in Sri Lanka.
Besides the field hospital in Mahiyanganaya, medical centres have also been set up in the badly hit Ja-Ela region and in Negombo. INS Vikrant, INS Udaygiri, and INS Sukanya provided immediate rescue and relief assistance to Sri Lanka.
Apart from the two Chetak helicopters deployed from INS Vikrant, two heavy-lift, MI-17 helicopters of the Indian Air Force are actively involved in evacuations and airlifting relief material, the release said.
At the request of the Sri Lankan Disaster Management Centre, a virtual meeting was organised between DMC and the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO)'s National Remote Sensing Centre on Saturday.
Since the onset of the disaster, ISRO has been providing maps to assist DMC in its rescue efforts, the release said.
