Status of Tri-Valley University

New Delhi: The Tri-Valley University (TVU) near San Francisco, California was shut down on January 19, 2011 by the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) on charges of immigration fraud. More than 1800 Indian students were affected by this fraud perpetrated by the TVU. As per current statistics furnished by the US authorities, 766 cases of Indian students of the TVU were approved for transfer to other universities, 480 cases are pending for scrutiny and 281 were denied transfer.

Government of India has taken up the issue of such Universities with the U.S. Government to protect the interests of the Indian students. The Government has strongly conveyed to the U.S. agencies that the students, themselves a victim of fraud, should not be penalized and held responsible for the violations committed by the University. Government has requested that there should be no mass termination of visas of the affected students, so that they do not go out of status, and the affected students should be given adequate time for transfer to other Universities: or voluntarily return to India, without prejudice.

The Embassy of India at Washington DC is keeping in touch with U.S. Department of Homeland Security(DHS) to ensure that the pending transfer cases of the Indian TVU students are considered by the US authorities in a sympathetic manner. The Government has also requested the U.S. Government to take steps to prevent recurrence of such instances.

A few students who required consular services were immediately helped by the Embassy of India at Washington DC. Sessions of guidance by reputed attorneys were organized by the Embassy/Consulate for the students in Washington DC and San Francisco.

This information was given by Dr. D. Purandeswari , Minister of State for Human Resource Development in written reply to a question in Lok Sabha.