US court seeks B-1 visa details from Infosys

A district court in Texas, US, has issued a subpoena to Infosys Technologies seeking details of the company’s use of B-1 business visas.

A subpoena is a court-issued command to an individual or representatives of corporate entities to provide specific evidence as sought by the court.

A US employee of Infosys Technologies had filed a suit before an Alabama court alleging the company was involved in misusing the B-1 business visa programme to send lower level and unskilled foreigners to the US to work in full-time positions.

According to the court order, Infosys is required to “provide to the grand Jury certain documents and records related to the company's sponsorships for and uses of B-1 business visas,” the Bangalore-headquartered company said in a filing to the Bombay Stock Exchange today.

The company has also announced that it intends to comply with the subpoena and to cooperate with the court’s investigation. “At this point in time, we are not being able to comment further on this grand jury investigation, but do want to reiterate that we take our legal compliance obligations very seriously,” Infosys said in a statement.

Legal experts say a subpoena can be issued by a court “either by someone’s request or on the request of the law enforcement agencies’ in the US. “The failure to comply with the subpoena will have a criminal ramification as well. If someone does not comply with a subpoena, it is considered as disobeyance of the law,” said eminent cyber law expert and advocate Pavan Duggal.

In a recent filing to the US market regulator, Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Infosys said that following the lawsuit by the company, a “US senator had submitted a letter to Secretary of State and Secretary of Homeland Security, requesting their respective departments to review the B-1 business visa programme and investigate the manner in which it is being utilised by companies, including Infosys.”

Legal experts said while different US states have their own jurisdictions, on the basis of the information obtained from one subpoena, other US states can also issue different subpoenas. “If a subpoena is issued and information given theirin, and on that basis courts in different states can also ask for or issue different subpoenas. Because, different states in the US have got their own laws and own jurisdiction. So technically speaking, courts in each state in the US are qualified to issue subpoena,” added Duggal.

While the number of US visas held by Infosys could not be obtained from the company, in a recent SEC filing Infosys had announced it had around 10,100 H-1B visa holders and L-1B visa holders, as of March 31.

This, however, did not include the numbers of Infosys BPO and other subsidiaries. According to a highly placed sources at Infosys, the number of B-1 visas held by the company constitutes around 1.5 per cent of the total US visas.