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870 Market Street
Suite 1028
San Francisco, CA
94102

(415) 391-0228

Mukul Bakshi
Indian with Extraordinary Ability in Advertising

by David N. Strand

Mukul Bakshi speaking at  the World Affairs Council of Northern California

Mukul Bakshi’s father was in the Indian Foreign Service. Mukul lived six years in Iran (from age three) and five years in England before returning to New Delhi where he finished high school and then studied English literature at Delhi University. One of his most vivid memories of Iran was swimming in the Caspian Sea with his father. His father told him they could not swim beyond a line of boats that were tied together because there were dangerous alligators beyond the boats. It was not until years later that he learned that there were no alligators in the Caspian Sea; the problem was unexploded mines.

Mountain climbing and hiking were his favorite activities, and he loved to photograph the wilderness. It seemed unlikely to him that he could make a living from these activities, but he did approach an advertising agency to see if he could do photography for them.

J. Walter Thompson (JWT) is one of the largest and prestigious advertising agencies in the world. Its Indian affiliate gave Mukul a routine test for employment and were so impressed with the talent of this English literature major that they offered him a position. He loved the job. He was impressed with his colleagues who seemed to him exceptionally well educated, widely traveled, and principled. He did well, was sought by head hunters, and after a few years moved to a different agency, where he initially intended to stay for years. But advertising in India was challenging, with more emphasis on native Indian languages, and his English literature background was less useful.

He took a break in 1999, visited England and then New York. He had never seen modern skyscrapers and wanted to see the twin towers. While in New York he called an ad agency to discuss employment opportunities and first learned, to his surprise, that a visa authorizing employment was necessary to work in the United States.

Shortly thereafter he visited San Francisco where USA Greetings, a provider of online greeting cards, petitioned for him to work for them in H-1B status as a professional editor and creative director.

H-1B status is limited to six years, and as the six year limit approached, Mukul came to our office to seek how he might legally continue to work in the United States.

A review of his resume suggested to me that he might be eligible for O-1 status, a nonimmigrant category for people of extraordinary ability in their fields of endeavor. It takes a great deal of time to prepare an O-1 petition. Because the expiration of his H-1B status was imminent he needed an immediate short term solution to be able to continue working.

Our strategy was twofold: extend his H1-B status a few months, and then apply for a change of status to O-1. We told him that he could extend his H-1B status beyond six years from when it was first granted if he could demonstrate that he had not been in the United States in H-1B status for a full six years. We reviewed his passport and travel records and determined that the expiration of his H-1B Status expired about two months short of a full six years. We filed at once to extend his H-1B status for an additional two months. We then began working on the O-1 petition.

To be eligible for O-1 status it is necessary to demonstrate sustained national or international acclaim and recognition for achievements in the field of expertise by providing evidence in at least three of eight categories:
1. Receipt of nationally or internationally recognized awards.
2. Membership in an organization that requires outstanding achievement.
3. Published materials in professional or major trade journals.
4. Judgment of works of others.
5. Original scientific or scholarly work of major significance.
6. Authorship of scholarly work.
7. Employment at an organization with a distinguished reputation.
8. High salary compared to others in the field.

The job title was Editor/Creative Director of a company that created online greeting cards. Our challenge was to develop the evidence and argument that Mukul Bakshi had extraordinary ability in the field. Extraordinary ability is defined in the immigration law as “a level of expertise indicating that the person is one of the small percentage who have risen to the very top of the field of endeavor.”

It sounds like an extremely high standard, virtually impossible to achieve by mere mortals. It has been my experience, however, if you are able to come up with at least some evidence of ability and expertise in most of the categories listed above, it is quite possible to achieve O-1 status. We submitted evidence in six of the eight categories.

As Editor/Creative Director of USA Greetings, Mukul Bakshi was responsible for planning and coordinating activities related to website content and layout, which included selecting, evaluating, composing, and editing content. To demonstrate extraordinary ability in the field of advertising, we demonstrated his employment in a critical and essential capacity for JWT, and we provided evidence that they are among the world’s leading advertising agencies. We submitted material from Advertising Age magazine; Duke University’s Center for Sales, Advertising, and Marketing History; and Harvard Business School’s Working Knowledge website. These sources demonstrated that JWT was the highest grossing advertising agency in the United States; one of the oldest, largest, and most innovative advertising firms in the world; and one of the most famous names in advertising history. We also submitted evidence of awards received by Mukul, his participation on panels judging the works of others, and his high salary.

To demonstrate that Mukul worked in a “critical and essential capacity” and made “contributions of major significance” in the field of advertising, we submitted letters from six top executives in the advertising industry and copies of articles establishing the luminous reputations of the writers of the letters.

The particular advertising campaign we focused upon was the advertising campaign, led by Mukul, that convinced Indian citizens to voluntarily report previously undisclosed income and pay their back taxes. The campaign netted $5.4 billion for the Indian government! We submitted articles from two Indian magazines describing this remarkably successful endeavor as well as evidence of the large circulation of the magazines.

In order to limit the period of time during which he would lack work authorization, we paid the required $1000 filing fee to the immigration service for premium processing.

Not unexpectedly, we received from USCIS a request for further evidence, which I have found to be very common in O-1 cases, particularly when premium processing is requested. They questioned the significance of his awards, the professional organizations with which he was affiliated, the publications we quoted, his experience judging others, articles he had written, his positions and his salary. The request appeared to be boilerplate because it questioned the significance of items that we had not even submitted.

We were able to submit additional evidence to establish the significance of the evidence already presented, and the case was approved.

Keeping in touch with clients after completing their cases enables me to appreciate their contributions of talent, energy and creativity to America. Mukul is a good example. In addition to his vocation, he has applied his considerable talents to other organizations, including the World Affairs Council of Northern California, where he was chosen for the Board of Directors and elected Chair of the International Forum.