CHANDIGARH: In yet another case of Punjabis falling prey to unscrupulous travel agents in order to go abroad to earn a livelihood, eleven women from the state are stuck in Muscat and have sent an SOS back home requesting to be rescued from the Gulf country.
In a video message shared by Sangrur MP Bhagwant Mann, who is also the Punjab unit AAP president, on his Twitter handle on Saturday, the eleven women sitting in the Indian Embassy in Muscat are seen asking for help so that they can come back home. With their faces covered, one the women pleaded, "We are eleven girls in the Indian embassy here (Muscat). We have been cheated by travel agents in Punjab. We were sent here for some other work but were forced to work as maids in the houses of our sponsors here. They used to beat us up and also did not give us food. The medical condition of all of us is bad.’’
The woman further said, "As I was beaten up. I have developed a disk problem and now cannot walk properly. I have high blood pressure and also developed a cervical issue. I came to the embassy here seven months ago. They told me to get my passport. The agent and the sponsor are not giving my passport so I am stuck here. The sponsor is asking for 1200 in Muscat currency to give my passport back and the same is the case with the other girls. We are poor girls and cannot give such kind of money to get back our passports so please help us. We tried to contact ministers in the Punjab government but nobody came forward to help us,’’ adding that her two children are alone back in Punjab and there is nobody to take care of them. She also said there is another girl in the group who has a heart problem.
Meanwhile, Mann said that he has sought time from the Union External Affairs Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar and will request him to bring these eleven women from Punjab back to India. He also requested anyone having the contact numbers or passport numbers of these women to get back to him.
In a similar case last November, 26 youths of Jalandhar, Hoshiarpur, Nawanshahr and Kapurthala were stuck in Russia after they were cheated by a travel agent. One of them, 30-year-old Malkiat Singh, died there as he did not get medical aid. Later, the agent was arrested by the Punjab Police. Singh’s body was brought back home and cremated.
Also, in July last year, seven Punjabi youths were stuck in Iraq for months after being cheated by a travel agent. Of them, five were from Phillaur and one each from Phagwara and Bholath. They were eventually rescued and sent back home.