Over 20K Indians Sought Political Asylum in U.S. Since 2014

Over 20,000 Indians have sought political asylum in the United States since 2014 and most of the asylum seekers are men, according to new data.

As per the information provided by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to the North American Punjabi Association (NAPA), till July this year, 7,124 Indians applied for asylum and of these, only 294 are women, reported PTI.

While breaking the figure of over 20,000 asylum seekers into year-wise distribution, the report says that in 2014 the number of Indian applicants for asylum in the U.S. was 2,306. In 2015, that number increased to 2,971, which included only 96 women, added the report.

In 2016, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security got asylum requests from 4,088 Indian nationals, which had 123 women applicants among them. In 2017, the figure somewhat declined to 3,656 Indian asylum seekers. However, the number of women asylum seekers has increased when compared to the previous year. In 2017, 187 Indian women applied for political asylum in the U.S.

Satnam Singh Chahal, Executive Director of California based NAPA, was quoted by PTI as saying, “The number of Indians who are seeking asylum in the US has almost doubled in the last two years. This is an issue of concern for all of us.”

Laws related to U.S. asylum are applied to those who “demonstrate that they were persecuted or fear persecution due to race, religion, nationality, political opinion, or membership in a particular social group,” as per US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS).

Chahal said that the people who are fleeing because of generalized crime or violence in their home country, don’t fit into these categories easily, according to the report.