More than 100 members of Immigration Voice – an organization comprising over 57,000 members of largely Indian highly- skilled professionals caught in the Green Card immigration backlog for years – descended on Capitol Hill last week to urge U.S. lawmakers to expedite the process so they could become part of a productive and competitive American workforce.

Aman Kapoor, the founder and president of Immigration Voice, told India Abroad, "Immigration Voice is grateful for the strong support shown by its members for our spring 2011 fly-in."

Kapoor, who founded the organization in December 2005, received his Green Card a couple of years ago after almost a decade-long wait. But he still continues to be the driving force behind the organization, he says, because he can empathize with what his fellow-members are going through.

"We conducted an unprecedented 370 office visits, which included 39 direct visits with members of Congress and 18 senators," he said.

"At no time has the Indian-American community ever engaged in such serious grassroots educational outreach," he said, "but this is needed because the issue is such a serious one, namely the 10- to 15-year backlog of Green Cards, which severely and directly affects one in four Indian Americans."

Kapoor declared, "Immigration Voice will continue to serve as voice for future Americans, who want nothing more than to share the American dream."

He argued, "The H-1B visa issue is a red herring." "The real immigration reform America needs is reforming the Green Card backlog." Nearly 200 organization members were at the Hill for two days to discuss possible solutions, such as eliminating the per-country limit in the high-skilled Green Cards category, recapturing unused visas from past fiscal years and creating a rollover system to capture any future unused visas.

Kapoor said, "Right now, with country caps, even the smallest nation gets the same number of visas allotted as India and China, which is unfair. Eliminating country caps will help clear the backlog and takes a realistic approach on managing immigration flows and where high-skilled immigrants are coming from."

He said that given that more than 250,000 Green Cards have been wasted over the years, recapturing them would help clear the backlog and create a rollover system to ensure future immigrants are not punished when unused visas go to waste.

Gopal Chauhan, who is also part of the leadership of Immigration Voice, a 501(c)(4) non-profit organization, told India Abroad that group members met with the law-makers over two days, concluding with a Congressional reception it hosted.

While Immigration Voice does not only represent Indians, the majority of its members are Indian. "We represent over half-a-million people who are stuck in this long backlog-this limbo, from five to over 10 years," Chauhan said.

Chauhan, of Redwood City, California, who works in the semi-conductor industry and has been waiting for his Green Card for more than nine years, said, "In our meetings with the lawmakers and their aides, we were specifically talking about the last stage, so to speak, of the Green Card process. We said we were representing people who were already here, working productively and contributing to the American economy in technology and various other highly-skilled professions and paying taxes and everything."

Chauhan, who has two master's degrees from the California Institute of Technology in Los Angeles, said the lawmakers were very receptive, but admitted that, as in any democracy, legislation takes time.

"We appreciate the lawmakers' efforts because they are doing their best. But we were here to educate them on the specific issues of our problem and, in the process, the American people too," he said.

Chauhan said, "One of the biggest misconceptions is that we are taking away American jobs. That is not true. As you know, one of every three start-ups in Silicon Valley was started by immigrants. There was no Google 12 years ago, and now they employ more then 24,000 people."

He added that he hoped "our American dream doesn't turn into a nightmare – and it has been a nightmare for so long for us. We've been in limbo for so many years."

Chauhan, who said he has worked for four start-ups and is now a research manager, said the majority of Immigration Voice members had gone through all of the hoops and processes after having come here on student visas and/ or H1Bs and then been sponsored by their companies for Green Cards, but then got stuck in the backlog because of the country quotas for India and China on which there is a cap for each year.

He warned that if people "get frustrated and finally return to their home countries or somewhere else, this intellectual capital would be lost to the US" and that these people could compete with the United States.

Chauhan said, during their meetings with the lawmakers and their aides, Immigration Voice members had fanned out on the Hill to stress this point.

"For example, I work in semi-conductors, and China is putting tons of money into semi-conductor manufacturing. Sooner or later they will reach a critical point where they will take leadership from American companies. We want America to be successful. Our objective is to use our skill sets here and keep America competitive and create American jobs."

"To do this, the House and the Senate has to pass a bill that makes this Green Card process smoother, removes the backlog and makes it easier for people like me to stay and be able to invest locally – buy a house and contribute to the American economy, particularly when the housing market is touching a new bottom. There are so many other ways in which we can contribute. But right now, we are in limbo and we cannot decide on anything long-term," he added.

Chauhan acknowledged that "right now, the overarching issue is the economy and jobs," but said he hoped Congress would not ignore their pleas and would use legislation to address their concerns.

Chauhan said most of the lawmakers and aides they met with understood that immigrants do not take away jobs but create them. But despite the positive response, there was no timeline to introducing legislation.

"In the end, we hope there will be something done sooner rather than later, because it's not just about Green Cards, but American competitiveness. There is some urgency to it."