US picks H-1B visa winners by lottery

The United States, which received nearly 124,000 applications for the H-1B visas, has used lottery to determine who all would be given the most sought after work visas among IT professionals. The United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) on Tuesday said that the lottery was done on April 7. The federal agency had started receiving applications for H-1B visas on April 1 and five days later on April 5 it announced to have reached the cap. "For the first time since 2008, USCIS has reached the statutory H-1B cap of 65,000 for fiscal year 2014 within the first week of the filing period," an official statement said, adding that it also got more than 20,000 H-1B petitions filed on behalf of persons exempt from the cap under the advanced degree exemption. "USCIS received approximately 124,000 H-1B petitions during the filing period, including petitions filed for the advanced degree exemption," USCIS said. April 10, 2013 http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2013-04-10/us/38433531_1_advanced-degree-exemption-h-1b-petitions-uscis