 On 16th of March 2020, the US embassies and consulates closed in India due to the coronavirus pandemic. At the time of closing, they mentioned that this was being done as a necessary precautionary step and the embassies would reopen as soon as it was safe to do so. Now that was back in March and we are currently in June, so what is the status right now? Keep on watching. Hey guys, my name is Shachi and I am a travel and visa coach. Every single day I get messages from so many of you asking about the status of the US visa interviews in India and what you can do about it right now. So in this video, I am going to address some of these questions and hopefully give some direction to you. So officially as of today that is 21st of June 2020, there is no announcement made by the US embassies and consulates in India regarding restarting or reopening of the visa process. There is nothing mentioned on their website and there is also nothing mentioned on their official Twitter account. In fact, when we try to reach out to them to clarify the same for you guys, this is the response that we have got. I am going to put it on the screen and also read it out to you. Unfortunately, we do not have an estimated time when services will resume. As soon as services are scheduled to resume, we will post an announcement to our website. So we do recommend those interested in visa services to monitor that site for any news. So once we read this naturally, the next question that arises in our mind is what are these timelines that we are looking at? And to understand this, let us look at the status of the US embassies in other countries in the world. And as of June 2020, the US embassy and consulate has not opened its office and not resumed the visa service in any country in the world. Few countries like the Dominican Republic have recently announced that they are going to restart the visa service soon. But as of today, nothing has officially started. In countries like Thailand, the US CIS, that is the US Citizenship and Immigration Services have finally reopened their offices in June. But the embassy and the consulate, which deals with the non-immigrant visas and the student visas still remains closed. So this really tells us that the US embassies and consulates are following a really cautious approach when it comes to restarting the visa process and they are not really in a hurry to do that. And also the approach is going to be different for each country. It's really going to depend upon the pandemic situation in that country and also the restrictions on international travel. We also have to keep in mind that international flights into the US have not resumed even as of June 2020. And right now the only flights which are flying in to the US from outside the country are those which are evacuating American citizens who have been stranded around the world. So taking stock of all of these things, if I personally had to put a timeline as to when the visa processes would reopen and this is just my own opinion, I would tell you not to expect anything till September and to October. I hate to do this to you guys but looking at the coronavirus statistic in India currently, I really think it's going to be a while before international travel and travel-based or non-immigration visas resumed. So if you're a business or a leisure traveler, I would strongly advise you not to make any travel plans this year or at least till the December of this year. If you're a student who's already got admission into a US university or a college and you're waiting for your visa interview, then do speak to your university and try and defer your admission by a sinister or tool. I know that a lot of universities and colleges in US are offering this option to their students this year. So do reach out to them. And lastly, if you have H-1B or L-1 visa and if you're stuck in India due to stamping issues or any other legal issues, then I totally understand your plight. Being away from your family and not having clarity on the timelines can be really taxing. But you can take some solace and some comfort in the fact that these visas are being given a higher priority and once the process resumes, this will be the first type of visas that will be catered to. So guys, I hope this video has given some direction to you. I'm tracking all the updates regarding the US visa process very, very regularly and as soon as there is something new, I'm going to bring this to you right here on this channel. So do not miss out on any of these updates. Do subscribe and hit the bell icon. In the meanwhile, if you would like to prepare for the US visa process, do check out all these videos on my channel. I'm sure they're going to help you. Signing off for now. I'll see you in the next one. Bye.