Hyderabad, January 31: The US authorities may have shown the way out to the Indian students of Tri-Valley University by allowing them to apply to other universities or come back home to apply again, but there was little relief for them especially those facing deportation.
Many of the detained Indian students of Tri-Valley University facing deportation are continuing to languish in detention centres in California because to get out they would have to furnish bonds to the tune of $5,000-22,000 depending on the state where they are detained.
Having taken loans back home to the tune of Rs 8-10 lakh, that’s money they cannot raise. Nor is the option to transfer to an accredited university a realistic or affordable option to most of them.
Some of the detained students have been served with Notices to Appear, considered as the first step of deportation process. These students, spread across the US from Ohio, Illinois and Washington to Pennsylvania, have little time remaining before deportation and are trying desperately the doors of other universities to be able to save their career.
Parents of some of the TVU students, many of whom are from Andhra Pradesh, are unaware that their children are studying at the sham university.
Some of them went to the US to join another university but shifted to TVU later, finding it cheaper.
Besides, Tri-Valley used to permit students to work from the first day of they joining the course. “Students who did not get scholarships or were not in a position to afford to pay the course fee used to prefer joining Tri- Valley,’’ said a student speaking to Express on the phone.
Around 1,500 students of TVU could face deportation if they don’t take any of the options provided.
“Unfortunately, several genuine students were lured from other reputed universities to TVU. They relied on ICE (Immigration and Cust oms E n f o r c eme n t ) a n d Tri-Valley University’s Student and Exchange Visitor Program (SEVP) designation to enroll at the university.
They genuinely believed that the university and its method of working had been authorized by the US federal government, including DHS (Department of Homeland Security) and ICE,” said president of the Telugu Association of North America, Jayaram Komati.
With the fate of TVU students uncertain, educational consultants in AP have been flooded with nervous enquiries from parents of students preparing to go to the US.
“We have received a number of calls from parents of students aiming to study in the US about the authenticity of universities in the US. While this is an individual case of a university not following the US rules, the entire image of the US as an education destination has taken a blow,” said P Anil Kumar, CEO of Youth- World Consulting.
–Agencies