‘Foreign students whose visa is revoked can legally stay in the U.S. and continue studies if university doesn’t disenroll’

The U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on March 27 that the State Department may have already revoked more than 300 visas of foreign students in the country. A senior State Department official previously told axios.com, a news website in the U.S., that more than 300 foreign students have had their student visas revoked after Mr. Rubio’s “Catch and Revoke” program began operations. The website says: “The reviews of social media accounts are particularly looking for evidence of alleged terrorist sympathies expressed after Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel, officials say.” While media reports talk about Indian students receiving emails from the U.S. government that their visas have been revoked and they need to self-deport since loss of immigration status would invite fines and deportation, immigration attorneys say this can be challenged in court. Earlier, the visa of Ranjani Srinivasan, a PhD student at Columbia university was revoked after she was designated as a “terrorist sympathiser” and accused of advocating for violence in support of Hamas, which the U.S. government has designated as a terrorist organisation. Mr. Ram said “In the April of 1968, there was a big protest against the atrocious U.S. aggression against Vietnam in the campus and thousands of students participated in it.” “Though the protest largely revolved around the Vietnam war, students were also protesting against the construction of a large gymnasium in Morningside Heights, near Harlem, next to Columbia University, as it would exclude the residents of Harlem,” he said.