For Indian Students, Dreams of America Are Suddenly in Doubt

In India, the country that sends more students to the United States than any other, young people who had hoped to pursue higher education in America this fall described feeling in a state of limbo after the Trump administration’s decision to pause interviews with foreign nationals applying for student visas.

Some are scrubbing their feeds, deleting comments and unfollowing accounts after the State Department said that it would screen social media use. Others are exchanging news and information in newly formed encrypted group chats. And some have sought divine aid in “visa temples” — so called because Hindu devotees say prayers there provide a greater chance of getting a tourist, study or work visa.

Career counselors have become therapists, and the extended family networks that many Indians have in America — uncles and aunts who will often help finance the education of a niece or nephew — have set up war rooms online. Other students are revisiting their backup plans or rethinking their academic paths.

“I have carefully built my profile to be able to get into the top policy programs in the U.S.,” said Kaushik Sharma, 28. He called it his “dream” to study in America but added that the current environment was making him nervous about applying. “I don’t want to go there and be in a constant state of fear,” he said. He is now considering similar public policy programs at universities in Britain and Singapore, he added.

Karan Gupta, a career counselor who coaches around 150 students a year and works with around six per day, said he had been inundated by calls in the past few days.

“There are students with admission letters who don’t know if they will get visa appointments, and those in the U.S. worried about their visa status,” Mr. Gupta said. Then, he added, there are those planning to apply to American universities next year calling to ask if “it’s a safe and stable choice.”