The National Association of Software and Service Companies on Sunday warned the United States about the impact of placing curbs on outsourcing, The Hindu reported. The IT industry group said it will also send a delegation to the US in February to reach out to President Donald Trump’s administration, which has taken a hard line against immigration for employment and outsourcing. Nasscom warns US about curbs on outsourcing, to send delegation to reach out to Trump administration

Nasscom President R Chandrasekhar said the US lacked the high-skill workers required to keep the country’s economy “globally competitive”. “The critical thing for this [IT] industry is high-skilled workers,” he said, adding that the US needed to acquire such employees if it wanted to pursue its agenda of job creation.

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The Nasscom chief further alleged that proposed curbs on the immigration of such high-skilled workers only applied to Indian companies. “If you say it is all right for company A to do it and not right for company B to do it, then the argument [of curbs on outsourcing] itself is invalid.” Chandrasekhar also noted that American units of Indian companies hired many Americans, as well.

Over 60% of the Indian IT industry’s revenues comes from the US. Proposed curbs on immigration and the hiring of foreign workers has sparked concerns among companies, which often use the H-1B and L1 work visa programmes to hire Indian professionals. A new Bill introduced in the US Congress on Thursday seeks to tighten the criteria to obtain an H-1B visa through several measures, including through ending the annual distribution of the visas through a lottery system and giving priority to foreign students graduating from American universities.

Trump had made immigration control a key plank of his election campaign. Following his victory in the November 8 presidential polls, Trump’s attorney general nominee Jeff Sessions had told legislators that Americans should not suffer for “someone willing to take a job for less pay”.