INDIA — Aaradhyaa Khodaria returned to India after six years in the United States, including at a FAANG-level company, and she has struggled to land interviews as Indian employers pass on her with what she calls “silent rejections.”
Her experience, reported by The Financial Express, has become a familiar problem for a growing number of Indian tech professionals who come home with U.S. credentials and find that global pedigrees do not automatically translate into offers.
Khodaria came back after a layoff and prolonged visa hurdles that made returning to the U.S. difficult, despite a master’s degree from a top U.S. university and what the report described as strong hands-on experience.
Recruiters and hiring managers in India often screen returnees out early because they see a mismatch between U.S. work histories and the immediate needs of local roles, even when the candidate looks Overqualified on paper.
Companies tend to prize India-specific context, current local tech stacks and project experience, which can leave returnees competing for mid-level jobs where hiring teams want fast ramp-up and minimal risk.
That risk calculation can turn against candidates with elite U.S. brands on their resumes, because employers may assume they will demand higher salaries, expect quick promotions or leave as soon as an overseas path opens again.
The same perception can shrink the number of interview callbacks, returning candidates say, because the “overqualified” label can become a shorthand for “expensive,” “impatient,” or “temporary.”
Visa disruption adds another layer for those who left the U.S. unwillingly, including H-1B workers who became caught in stamping delays and other regulatory hurdles that complicate any quick return.
Thousands of H-1B professionals now face long waits for visa interviews, with many stamping appointments delayed into 2027, leaving some careers on hold and pushing others into an urgent restart in India.
The consequence for many returnees is a resume gap or a career interruption that does not fit neatly into Indian hiring pipelines, especially for candidates whose U.S. roles were highly specialized.
U.S. policy changes in late 2025 and early 2026 have added to the uncertainty around the H-1B route, changing calculations for workers and employers on both sides of the labor market.
On December 23, 2025, USCIS announced a final rule, effective February 27, 2026, to replace the random H-1B lottery with a weighted selection process prioritizing higher-paid and higher-skilled workers.
“The existing random selection process of H-1B registrations was exploited and abused by U.S. employers who were primarily seeking to import foreign workers at lower wages. The new weighted selection will better serve Congress’ intent for the H-1B program and strengthen America’s competitiveness by incentivizing American employers to petition for higher-paid, higher-skilled foreign workers,”
said USCIS spokesman Matthew Tragesser.
The USCIS announcement appeared on an agency news release dated Dec. 23, 2025, at DHS changes process for awarding H-1B work visas to better protect American workers.
Another shift took effect December 15, 2025, when DHS implemented mandatory social media screening for all employment-based visa applicants, a step officials said slowed processing.
In a DHS newsroom item dated Jan 2026, officials said “additional checks have led to fewer daily interviews,” tying the change directly to throughput at consular processing stages.
U.S. state-level action has also emerged. On January 26, 2026, Texas Governor Greg Abbott issued a directive freezing new H-1B applications for all state agencies and public universities.
The directive aimed to ensure “taxpayer-funded positions are filled by Texans first,” according to the Office of the Texas Governor.
For Indian professionals trying to plan around a U.S. return, visa stamping availability has become a defining constraint, pushing some to treat a move back to India as more permanent than intended.
Department of State appointment system data as of January 28, 2026, showed consulates in New Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Hyderabad, and Kolkata had no regular interview slots for the remainder of 2026.
Many appointments had already been pushed into April and May 2027, according to the same appointment data, extending timelines that workers and employers previously managed in months, not years.
A late-2025 Department of State policy change ended third-country stamping for Indian nationals, funneling applicants back to Indian posts and intensifying the bottleneck.
The backlog has practical effects for returnees who traveled to India for family or personal reasons and then found they could not quickly resume their U.S. jobs, forcing a search for work at home.
A further flashpoint came in late 2025 with a new fee structure that raised the cost of some filings and added uncertainty for candidates outside the United States.
A controversial $100,000 filing fee for H-1B petitions for beneficiaries outside the U.S. was introduced in late 2025, and it has faced legal challenges.
Its introduction has coincided with reports of U.S. tech firms rescinding offers to candidates abroad, tightening the pipeline that once made U.S. experience a reliable backstop for Indian tech careers.
Even for those still trying to enter the system, the cap has remained a hard barrier. USCIS reached the congressionally mandated cap of 85,000 visas, including 20,000 for U.S. advanced degree holders, on July 18, 2025.
The agency posted the cap update at USCIS reaches fiscal year 2026 H-1B cap, underscoring how quickly demand can outstrip available visas.
India’s Ministry of External Affairs also weighed in on the human impact of visa delays and fee hikes. On September 22, 2025, the ministry warned that sudden fee hikes and visa delays were likely to have “humanitarian consequences by way of the disruption caused for families.”
In India’s job market, recruiters often seek evidence that a returnee can translate U.S. accomplishments into local outcomes, especially when the work in the U.S. depended on platforms, budgets, or organizational structures uncommon in domestic firms.
That can put candidates from FAANG or similar employers in a paradox: the very signals that helped them stand out abroad can trigger questions at home about fit, cost and staying power.
Hiring teams may also worry that a returnee views an India role as a stopgap until the next U.S. window opens, particularly when H-1B stamping delays move in unpredictable jumps.
The result, returnees say, is a cycle of minimal feedback. Applicants submit resumes, see little movement, and get no explanation as roles close or move to other candidates.
Career advisers and recruiters in India often tell returnees to rewrite their profiles for the domestic market, focusing less on brand-name employers and more on measurable work that maps to Indian business needs.
For some, that means showing how they solved cross-border problems, adapted to constraints, or delivered outcomes that matter to Indian employers rather than highlighting U.S.-specific tooling alone.
Returnees also increasingly consider roles beyond traditional tech tracks as they look for a foothold, including consulting roles, startups or scaleups, contract or freelance positions, and roles requiring cross-border business skills.
Such choices can help candidates rebuild local momentum while they wait out U.S. timelines that, for many, no longer align with family or financial planning.
Networking remains central in India’s hiring ecosystem, where referrals and informal checks can carry as much weight as formal applications.
Professionals returning from the U.S. often intensify outreach on platforms such as LinkedIn, engage with local tech communities and meetups, and reconnect with peers who have already transitioned home or work internationally.
The tension in stories like Khodaria’s sits at the intersection of two moving systems: a U.S. immigration process that has tightened and slowed, and an Indian hiring market that evaluates seniority, compensation and job stability through a local lens.
For candidates, that means U.S. experience can open doors in some cases but close them in others, when employers see a profile as Overqualified or mismatched to the role’s pay band and progression.
As visa queues stretch into 2027 and policy changes reshape the H-1B pathway, many returnees face a more complicated reality than the one they left: rebuilding careers at home while the route back abroad grows harder to predict.
Overqualified H‑1B Faang Returnee Struggles to Land Jobs Back in India
Tech workers returning to India after years in the U.S. are facing a ‘silent rejection’ phenomenon. Despite elite credentials, they are often seen as too expensive or likely to leave. Combined with U.S. visa appointments being pushed to 2027 and new restrictive H-1B policies, many professionals are being forced to pivot their career strategies to focus on the Indian market’s specific local needs.
