Visa hurdle grounds 540 GTU students
Yogesh Avasthi and Hemington James
Posted On Friday, May 20, 2011 (http://www.ahmedabadmirror.com/article/2/20110520201105200308136861aeda39c/Visa-hurdle-grounds-540-GTU-students.html)
» The students of technology varsity were to visit US campuses for a summer camp
» Consulate cancelled the B2 visa granted and asked them to apply for J category
» Insurance company to which students were directed says the programme is cancelled
» GTU says it is trying to pull off the June 1-27 tour; now Canada camp is being planned
The dream of about 540 Gujarat Technological University students to attend a summer camp at Oklahoma University (OU) and Kansas State University (KSU) in the US is all but shattered. Their own university failed to identify the right category of visa they needed. To compound their woes, the US consulate apparently changed its decision on the visa category the students needed to set foot on the US soil.
They were advised to go for J category of visa, which may take up to eight weeks and fresh set of documents. It is now next to impossible for the students to report to the US universities, as advised by them, between June 1 and 8.
About a dozen students had bought tickets. Visa hurdle may lead to them losing their money. They now hope GTU’s plans to take them to Canada clicks and they can get the much cherished foreign exposure to add to their CV.
Rajendra Jani’s son Kedar is student of third year engineering in a self-financed engineering college of the city. Like other fathers he wanted to send his son to the June 1-27 summer camp to the OU, with which GTU has signed an MoU.
When he went to GTU, he found that the staff there was completely blank about the programme and they did not have any idea of how to send students to OU. So he contacted the US university and an insurance company which offers health insurance to students going abroad. From the insurance company Jani came to know that the programme has been cancelled. Jani realised he had wasted the money on buying ticket and applying for the visa.
VISAS CANCELLED
Jani’s is not the only case. There are around 10 students of GTU whose visas have been cancelled after they were granted the same. The reason the US consulate has given to them is that since the course they are going to attend is a longer duration programme the students cannot get B2 visa which they were earlier granted. They have to obtain J visa, which the students cannot get as they are not getting sponsorship either from GTU or from OU. Now neither GTU nor OU is guiding them on what to do next so that they can attend the summer course.
GTU in January this year had signed a memorandum of understanding with the OU and KSU for the course “Creating value in a culturally diverse, interconnected world” as summer camp. Other courses that were offered to the students were product design and value engineering, energy conservation and management, industrial engineering and operations research.
B2 VISA: OU OFFICIAL
As many as 360 students were to go to OU and 180 were to go to KSU for the summer camp. Post the announcement, GTU sat tight on the MoU for almost two months. When the students approached the university officials they could not inform them the category of visa they had to apply for.
Finding no way, on March 25, students wrote to OU to seek help. On the same day university official Kylie Hill Hubbard wrote back to them that ‘because the students from GTU will not be receiving any school credit from OU, but will be receiving grades through GTU this does not allow students to receive J visa appointments as exchange students. In this case we ask that your student be issued a B2 visitors business visa as this visa is appropriate for students who will be attending camps or seminars and not receiving college credit from the US university.”
J VISA: US CONSULATE
Following this the students applied for B2 visa to the US consulate in Mumbai on March 6 and around 10 students along with Kedar got B2 visa on the very next day. A month later in May these students got a call from the US consulate asking them to reappear for an interview. When these students went to Mumbai they were told by the officers at the consulate that since theirs is a long-term course, they cannot be allowed to travel on B2 visa and they will have to get J visa which is for students.
“We are not getting any answers from GTU and OU is asking us to travel on B2. The US consulate does not allow us to travel on B2. How would we go for the summer course?” asked Kedar who came to know through his father that the course has been cancelled.
“When approached, OU gave us the name of Macori Inc for health insurance of Kedar. When we wrote to the insurance company it us on April 19 that the programme has been cancelled. On one hand, the OU is asking us to get J visa, on the other hand the insurance company is telling us that the programme has been cancelled. Where do we go? How would we know what to do? We got the tickets fixed and we did preparation for the journey, who will reimburse us now?” asked Jani.
IF NOT US, THEN CANADA: GTU
Mirror’s email to OU seeking clarity went unanswered.
When contacted, GTU Vice Chancellor Akshai Aggarwal could not explain why the consulate stopped giving B2 category visa to his students.
“We have heard that the US Consulate has been giving the Visas to GTU students on the basis of documents given by OU and KSU. However, during the last 10 days or so, the Consulate seems to have changed the policy and we have heard that it is telling the new applicants that since 2010, it had been committing a mistake, which it did not want to commit any further,” Dr Aggarwal said.
“We are working to somehow get in touch with top officers at US consulate,” he said, adding that the university would try to take its students to a Canadian university for the summer camp if the OU trip does not materialise.
Dr Aggarwal conceded that students would not have received credits upon completion of the programme either at OU of KSU. “A general certificate of attendance was a possibility,” he said.
However, Dr Aggarwal said that attending the camp would have benefited the students.
“All pedagogic studies done in the west and China (at SJTU, Shanghai) show that it greatly helps a student. PDPU (Pandit Deendayal Petroleum University, Gandhinagar) claims that the students, who visited the USA in 2010 improved their academic performance greatly,” he said.
Posted On Friday, May 20, 2011 (http://www.ahmedabadmirror.com/article/2/20110520201105200308136861aeda39c/Visa-hurdle-grounds-540-GTU-students.html)
» The students of technology varsity were to visit US campuses for a summer camp
» Consulate cancelled the B2 visa granted and asked them to apply for J category
» Insurance company to which students were directed says the programme is cancelled
» GTU says it is trying to pull off the June 1-27 tour; now Canada camp is being planned
The dream of about 540 Gujarat Technological University students to attend a summer camp at Oklahoma University (OU) and Kansas State University (KSU) in the US is all but shattered. Their own university failed to identify the right category of visa they needed. To compound their woes, the US consulate apparently changed its decision on the visa category the students needed to set foot on the US soil.
They were advised to go for J category of visa, which may take up to eight weeks and fresh set of documents. It is now next to impossible for the students to report to the US universities, as advised by them, between June 1 and 8.
About a dozen students had bought tickets. Visa hurdle may lead to them losing their money. They now hope GTU’s plans to take them to Canada clicks and they can get the much cherished foreign exposure to add to their CV.
Rajendra Jani’s son Kedar is student of third year engineering in a self-financed engineering college of the city. Like other fathers he wanted to send his son to the June 1-27 summer camp to the OU, with which GTU has signed an MoU.
When he went to GTU, he found that the staff there was completely blank about the programme and they did not have any idea of how to send students to OU. So he contacted the US university and an insurance company which offers health insurance to students going abroad. From the insurance company Jani came to know that the programme has been cancelled. Jani realised he had wasted the money on buying ticket and applying for the visa.
VISAS CANCELLED
Jani’s is not the only case. There are around 10 students of GTU whose visas have been cancelled after they were granted the same. The reason the US consulate has given to them is that since the course they are going to attend is a longer duration programme the students cannot get B2 visa which they were earlier granted. They have to obtain J visa, which the students cannot get as they are not getting sponsorship either from GTU or from OU. Now neither GTU nor OU is guiding them on what to do next so that they can attend the summer course.
GTU in January this year had signed a memorandum of understanding with the OU and KSU for the course “Creating value in a culturally diverse, interconnected world” as summer camp. Other courses that were offered to the students were product design and value engineering, energy conservation and management, industrial engineering and operations research.
B2 VISA: OU OFFICIAL
As many as 360 students were to go to OU and 180 were to go to KSU for the summer camp. Post the announcement, GTU sat tight on the MoU for almost two months. When the students approached the university officials they could not inform them the category of visa they had to apply for.
Finding no way, on March 25, students wrote to OU to seek help. On the same day university official Kylie Hill Hubbard wrote back to them that ‘because the students from GTU will not be receiving any school credit from OU, but will be receiving grades through GTU this does not allow students to receive J visa appointments as exchange students. In this case we ask that your student be issued a B2 visitors business visa as this visa is appropriate for students who will be attending camps or seminars and not receiving college credit from the US university.”
J VISA: US CONSULATE
Following this the students applied for B2 visa to the US consulate in Mumbai on March 6 and around 10 students along with Kedar got B2 visa on the very next day. A month later in May these students got a call from the US consulate asking them to reappear for an interview. When these students went to Mumbai they were told by the officers at the consulate that since theirs is a long-term course, they cannot be allowed to travel on B2 visa and they will have to get J visa which is for students.
“We are not getting any answers from GTU and OU is asking us to travel on B2. The US consulate does not allow us to travel on B2. How would we go for the summer course?” asked Kedar who came to know through his father that the course has been cancelled.
“When approached, OU gave us the name of Macori Inc for health insurance of Kedar. When we wrote to the insurance company it us on April 19 that the programme has been cancelled. On one hand, the OU is asking us to get J visa, on the other hand the insurance company is telling us that the programme has been cancelled. Where do we go? How would we know what to do? We got the tickets fixed and we did preparation for the journey, who will reimburse us now?” asked Jani.
IF NOT US, THEN CANADA: GTU
Mirror’s email to OU seeking clarity went unanswered.
When contacted, GTU Vice Chancellor Akshai Aggarwal could not explain why the consulate stopped giving B2 category visa to his students.
“We have heard that the US Consulate has been giving the Visas to GTU students on the basis of documents given by OU and KSU. However, during the last 10 days or so, the Consulate seems to have changed the policy and we have heard that it is telling the new applicants that since 2010, it had been committing a mistake, which it did not want to commit any further,” Dr Aggarwal said.
“We are working to somehow get in touch with top officers at US consulate,” he said, adding that the university would try to take its students to a Canadian university for the summer camp if the OU trip does not materialise.
Dr Aggarwal conceded that students would not have received credits upon completion of the programme either at OU of KSU. “A general certificate of attendance was a possibility,” he said.
However, Dr Aggarwal said that attending the camp would have benefited the students.
“All pedagogic studies done in the west and China (at SJTU, Shanghai) show that it greatly helps a student. PDPU (Pandit Deendayal Petroleum University, Gandhinagar) claims that the students, who visited the USA in 2010 improved their academic performance greatly,” he said.
