July Visa Bulletin Released: India 2nd Preference may Progress In the Coming Months

The Department of State recently released the July visa bulletin. While forward movement for the coming month was small or non-existent (1st preference remains current for all countries, 2nd preference is current for all but India (Sept. 1, 2004) and China (August 8, 2008), 3rd preference is at January 1, 2009 for all countries except India (January 22, 2003) and the Philippines (October 1, 2006)) the bigger news was the projected movement in the coming months. According to the DOS, China 2nd preference will move forward about 2 months, nothing major but good movement forward. However, for India, the DOS states as follows:

At this time it appears that the availability of “otherwise unused” Employment Second
preference numbers will allow for movement of this cut-off date in August and/or September. It is expected that such movement will generate heavy new applicant demand, primarily by those who are upgrading their status from the Employment Third preference category. A sustained level of heavy demand could impact the cut-off date at some point during fiscal year 2014.

Because other countries have not used up all their visas, they will start moving India forward, probably a good bit, but their prediction is that this will just exacerbate demand even more because the 3rd preference category is even more backlogged for India. as the new bulletins are published, I will post the new dates right here on this blog.