ROURKELA: Seven businessmen from Sundargarh were deported from Bangkok airport in Thailand on Sunday for not having the adequate amount of local currency, Thai Baht.
Prashant Panda of Rajgangpur town, Naresh Mangla and Sanjay Lohani of Rourkela city, Priyaranjan Joshi of Sundararh town and three others of Sundargarh district were detained at Bangkok and deported after 26 hours for not having 10,000 Thai Baht.
They are all local dealers of a company dealing with bathroom fittings which had organised their travel and stay till August 14.Panda said they boarded the flight on August 9 at Delhi and reached Bangkok at 3 am on August 10 with the return tickets for August 14. The Bangkok airport security randomly intercepted them and asked each of them to show 10,000 Thai Baht. He said they had valid travel documents and adequate Indian currency, but not enough Thai currency which is mandatory for travelling in the country.
All the seven businessmen claimed that they were unaware of this criteria of Thai Government. They were kept in the detention room of airport for at least 26 hours till next flight at 5 am on August 11. Panda said they also contacted the Indian embassy for help, but to no avail.
He said they tried to convince the airport security that they were on an arranged tour and had adequate Indian currency for exchange with Thai Baht, but the officials did not pay heed to any request.
Panda said 33 Indian tourists were on the same company tour, but only seven of them were randomly intercepted, while rest were allowed to go.