New Delhi, Dec. 13 -- In the past few months, immigration lawyers in the United States have reported several dozen cases of arrests of foreign spouses of Americans during interviews at US Citizenship and Immigration Services offices.

Scores of such cases belong to San Diego alone, while cases have also been reported in New York City, Cleveland and Utah, according to an NBC report citing immigration lawyers and local news.

This marks an "unprecedented" diversion from a decades-long policy, the news outlet reported quoting lawyers, whose clients are panicked that they might be detained even when they are eligible to obtain legal permanent US citizenship and have no history of crime.

The detentions of green card applicants is one of the l...