Consider regulatory authority to deal with illegal travel agents
CHANDIGARH:: The Punjab and Haryana high court has suggested the Haryana government to consider a regulatory authority in each district to check cheating cases by unscrupulous travel agents.
The high court bench of justice Arun Monga requested the home secretary and the director general of police to have a meeting to explore the possibility of preventing illegal immigration/human trafficking.
“..they may constitute some kind of regulatory body and/or nominate an officer in every district who would have to necessarily issue an accreditation certificate as a pre-requisite to every agent claiming to be in business of immigration/naturalization and/or offering overseas jobs to the public at large in their state,” the bench said, adding that accredited agents list can be uploaded on the website so that a background check can be carried out on their genuineness/credentials, before anyone hires their services.
The order came on the bail plea of a travel agent, who was accused of sending a Kurukshetra resident abroad illegally for an amount of ₹20 lakh. The court termed the content of the FIR ‘no less chilling and shuddering than a goosebumps giving’ and observed that factual narrative of the FIR and the ordeal suffered by the complainant, is a sordid tale on how unscrupulous immigration agents deceive gullible Indians who are aspirants of overseas jobs.
As per the FIR, the agent took ₹10 lakh from the complainant and the remaining money was to be paid on his successful arrival in USA.
The complainant reached South America instead of the United States. He was made to take a flight from Delhi to Sao Paulo in Brazil and then to Ecuador (South America). He travelled from Ecuador in a bus to Columbia (South America) and then by sailing in a boat to Capurgana (Colombia).there he was bunched with illegal immigrants, who then trekked the thick forests of Panama (Central America), where they stayed for five days and another 24 days in an army camp before travelling to Nicaragua (Central America) and onward to Honduras (Central America) from where he was taken to Mexico for entering the United States of America.
When the complainant reached the US, he was arrested in California for illegally entering the country and lodged in a jail in Georgia. For 10 months, he continued to languish in Georgia prison but due to Covid-19 outbreak and he was deported.
The FIR was lodged after his return to India in May this year.