Visa restrictions turn Indian women into ‘involuntary housewives’ in the United States

LOS ANGELES — Sinduja Rangarajan belongs to a group of women who call themselves “involuntary housewives.”

The group is made up of Indian women who moved to the United States because their husbands landed great jobs, but who aren’t legally allowed to pursue their own career-related ambitions, because of what critics say are antiquated immigration rules.

“It’s like your are documented but undocumented, because you cannot legally work anywhere—even under the table or at a Starbucks,” said Rangarajan, adding that many Indian women are forced back into traditional gender roles they fought hard to put behind them. 

“I slowly slept into a depression,” she said. “What killed me was the way society perceived a woman who didn’t have a job. Like I wasn’t worth anything.”

H-4 visas are given to the spouses of highly skilled workers who enter the country on special H-1B worker visas to fill needed positions in thriving industries, like engineering, technology science and business. An H-4 visa holder is not allowed a social security number and is only permitted to stay in the US as long as the primary visa holder, often the husband, is in the US as well.

H-1B visas are in high demand—with the government having just “burned through” all of those slots available for 2015—and, along with H-4 visas, are a key part of the immigration reform debate, as President Obama pushes to provide work authorization to its holders against much resistance from the Republican-controlled House.

The United States issued 80,015 H-4 visas in 2012—seventy-five percent of which are women. More than half, 53,877 were issued to Indians, forging an obscure but growing community across the country.

H-4 visa holders can open bank accounts, but because they are not allowed to work, very few see the point.

They can study at a US school, but many enter the country already holding multiple degrees. Those who do want to pursue an education are not eligible for scholarships or student loans.

They are also required to pay taxes.

As a result, studies show these immigration laws create and perpetuate conditions for violence against immigrant women, as Indian H-4 visa holders make up a disproportionate number of women accessing services from South Asian women’s organizations that handle domestic abuse like the San Francisco-based Maitri.

These women, limited to relying on their husbands’ income, must put their lives on hold, often waiting eight to 10 years before their green card is approved and they can legally work.

“Our lives are suspended,” said Meghna Damani, who was on a H-4 visa for about five years and made an autobiographical documentary about her experience. “I think the whole set up itself is abusive because you have to be dependent on this one person for everything.”

Almost every other US work visa gives dependents work permits of their own, Damani pointed out.

Originally, the H-1B visa program was created for “temporary” workers and their spouses because the government did not intend for these immigrants to stay in the US, explained Neil Ruiz, a senior immigration expert at the Brookings Institute.

But then the workers wanted to stay.

“Employers could then sponsor H-1B visa holders for a green card but there was no change at this time on the H-4s,” said Ruiz. “This is why we ended up with a H-1B program that is problematic and why Indian citizens on average wait 10 years for a green card once they are sponsored from an H-1B.”

But recent developments have brought the stories of H-4 holders into the public light.

A change.org petition has been filed. Damani’s small documentary made it into six different film festivals and most recently screened at the Asian American Film Lab. Chat rooms overflow with emotions, frustrations and supportive advice from Indian wives who are dependent on their husbands in a new country.

Besides a space to vent, these forums also offer suggestions on how to fill seemingly endless days without a job, and connect H-4 holders nationwide.

Shivali Shah, an immigration attorney, has worked with nearly a thousand H-4 women over 14 years, and says the government is slowly realizing “this group of women exists.”

“There is a high level of depression in this community,” said Shah.

A section in President Obama’s proposed immigration reform would allow H-4 holders to work, but Shah said its perpetual “pending” status is a painful pill for many women to swallow.

Shah conducted an extensive study on H-4 women and found most are Indian, college educated, successful and had arranged or semi-arranged marriages. None of the women she interviewed had their own assets or income source. Many were victims of verbal and emotional abuse with no way to escape it—visa restrictions bar H-4 abuse victims from getting a divorce, alimony, or custody of their children.

Silvia Pinheiro started an H-4 support group in the South Bay, a hot spot for H-4 visas near Silicon Valley.

Pinheiro says of her 137 female members, 60 percent are Indian.

“For many of these women, money means independence, power and if they are unhappy they cannot go back to India because they think their families will not accept them,” she said.

Hindu temples provide some relief for Hindu women who struggle with not having “a purpose in life” in the United States, Pinheiro added.

But Shah said most of these women had “big plans” when they married, and volunteering or spiritual practice are not enough to fulfill them.

“They did not grow up imagining they would be housewives,” said Shah. “Their immigration status makes them inferior to their husbands.”

Rangarajan recently decided to return to school after almost two years on an H-4.

She is now earning a second master’s degree, this time in journalism from the University of Southern California.

When she switched to a student visa, called an F-1, her husband had to legally approve it.

“The F-1 boosts my self-esteem because now I am a student first, then somebody’s spouse,” she said.

Shah called the lack of support and recognition for these women “heartbreaking,” but noted that they have made progress.

“In 2005 nobody had heard of this visa, no one knew who these women are,” Shah said. “Now people are realizing there is this population of women out there.”