Four more Indian students freed of radio tags in US
By Arun Kumar, IANSFriday, February 25, 2011
WASHINGTON - US authorities have removed radio tags of four more Indian students of the sham Tri Valley University (TVU) in California closed on charges of immigration visa fraud last month.
So far radio tags of 11 of the 18 Indian students who were forced to wear the monitor anklets have been removed by the US Immigration and Custom Enforcement (ICE).
Officials at the Indian consulate in San Francisco expect ICE to remove radio tags of all the 15 students who had sought its legal help in the matter. The fate of the three others is not known as they preferred to go through their own independent lawyers.
The Indian consulate worked with the South Asian Bar Association (SABA) in this regard.
The consulate has now asked ICE to take off the Notice to Appear (NTA) because as long as these notices are out, deportation proceedings can be held against a person. ICE has said it’s only a procedural matter and will be done soon.
“ICE has committed that they would no longer be issuing NTAs. They are not sending people to the houses of the students. They are talking to them on phone,” an official said.
Some 1,555 TVU students, 90 percent of them from India, mostly Andhra Pradesh, face the prospect of deportation unless they can get admission in another institution to retain their student visa status.
(Arun Kumar can be contacted at arun.kumar@ians.in)
