Arun Kumar/IANS

Washington, Aug 13: Once much sought by Indian professionals, the US H1B visas are going abegging this year in a recession-hit economy with applications still falling 16,000 short of the Congressionally mandated cap of 65,000.

The US Citizenship and Immigration Services said it has received approximately 49,000 H1B petitions till Aug 7 counting toward the 65,000 cap, more than four months after it started accepting applications for visas for the 2010 fiscal beginning October.

This is in contrast to the previous years when the USCIS had to resort to a computerised draw of lots as it received petitions outnumbering several times more than the cap of 65,000 within the first few days of starting accepting H1B applications.

The figure of 20,000 slots in the vacant category has remained almost the same for the last two months due to a large number of rejections of H1B petitions following greater scrutiny.

Indian IT professionals have been a major beneficiary of the H1B visa programme in the past. An additional 20,000 H1B can also be issued to those foreign professionals who have masters or higher degree from the US.

Though the USCIS received 20,000 petitions, it continues to accept applications in this category too. For the fiscal 2010, the USCIS started receiving H1B petitions from April 1. In the first five working days, it received 42,000 H1B petitions. After that, USCIS has received just 7,000 more H1B petitions in the last four months.