After waiting in vain for decades to obtain permanent residency (green card) and realise their ‘Great American Dream’, many Indian families are relocating to Canada. Reasons: Ease of entry, better career opportunities and convenience of settling down. Rough estimates suggest at least 20,000 Indians make this migration — from the US to Canada — every year. “I went through at least six H-1B visa extensions since I joined work. I was living in constant stress,” said Dinesh Dasari, a native of Hyderabad, who moved from Maryland to Toronto this July. This, after a 14-year-long stint in the US. The solutions architect said his career had stagnated because of the delay in getting a green card. “A person’s green card petition is stuck to the employer. This makes it difficult for you to switch jobs,” said Dasari. “Even moving to a managerial position is difficult because employers are sceptical about grooming and investing in a person who they are not sure will be able to stay in the country,” he added. The immigration of thousands of Indians comes at a time when the community has been lobbying for the passage of the Fairness for High-Skilled Immigrants Act of 2019, better known as S386, in the Senate. The bill seeks to end the cap for job-based green cards in the US. Currently, there is a 7% cap on Indians for issuing a green card every year, creating a huge backlog. There are approximately 9,00,000 Indians (holding H-1B, L1 and H4 EAD) in the US. When people ask me if they should stay or move, I always suggest the latter,” said immigration attorney Rahul Reddy of Reddy & Neumann, PC, adding the express entry to Canada has made it possible for people to get PR in less than a year. “People can simply apply online without even consulting an immigration attorney,” he said.