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The Dark Side of the Moon – Horrors of Illegal Immigration

THE ISSUE

 

In the Malta boat tragedy in 1996, 289 South Asians including about 170 youth from Punjab seeking illegal foreign passage found a watery grave in the Ionian Sea. The tragedy was repeated recently when about 20 Punjab residents heading to USA reportedly drowned near the Panama – Colombian coast, when a vessel ferrying the illegal immigrants capsized.  A survivor brought back the unfortunate tale of woe. Sad but true, merchants of death run thriving rackets of human smuggling in Punjab without fear or abandon, trapping gullible youth with dollar dreams. Innocent citizens are duped daily and this organised crime perpetuates horror and misery flourishing by the day with impunity and utter disregard for law.

 

PROBLEM GALORE


Smuggled migrants are vulnerable to exploitation. Their lives are put to risk. The victims have suffocated in containers at high seas, perished in deserts, drowned in oceans or have been herded as forced labour in slave camps. Smugglers of human beings conduct their activities brazenly with no regard for safety of life. Survivors tell harrowing tales of their ordeal. Forced to sit in body waste, deprived of food and water, they have watched those around them die to be thrown overboard and dumped at sea or perished on road sides. Those apprehended, languish in foreign jails, with no hope of return. Smuggling of illegal immigrants generates high net worth profits at hands of mafias who fuel corruption and ignite organised crime. Such movement is a deadly business, which like terror strikes, has to be now combated with grave urgency.

 

 ATTEMPT OF LAW


Punjab was the first state to enact the Punjab Human Smuggling Act, 2012 which was rechristened as the Punjab Travels Professional Regulation Act, 2012. It seeks to provide a mandatory registration and licensing regime for any and every category of persons conducting any activity akin to a travel agent that involves arranging, managing or conducting affairs related to sending people abroad. It debars agents operating without a license. Violation entails penalties. Punishment upto seven years of imprisonment is prescribed and compensation is payable by an agent to an aggrieved person upon adjudication. Cheating as defined in criminal law is applicable. Regardless, the malady thrives as agents choose not to register. Unscrupulous fly by night operators take advantage, trading in death hoodwinking gullible youth to foreign pastures who never reach their El Dorado. Those trapped are obliterated, never to return and condemned to die.

 

NO CONTROLLING LAW


Prevention is better than cure. Here, no law made by Parliament provides either. The Emigration Act, 1983, authorises a Protector General of Emigrants to authorise emigration clearance to Indian immigrants, to prevent exploitation at hands of recruiting agents who duck mandatory registration and licensing by claiming that they do not conduct recruitment. In stark reality, recruitment agents exploit Indian workers by unfair contracts on false promises, never to be caught being registered under no law. The Punjab law is avoided by claiming that agents are consultants requiring no registration under the State law. It is a free trading with no check or control.

 

POSSIBLE SOLUTIONS


·                     The dire need is in enacting a new Central all India umbrella legislation comprehensively targeting all categories of agents, consultants, recruitment representatives and all concerned with  sending persons overseas.


·                     The urge for illegal migration cannot be curbed. The need for migration needs to be channelized and need for sustainable solutions needs to be explored. Legalized, managed, integrated and organised migration must be opted for. The only way of migration by legal means must be publicized.


·                     The suggested solutions possible are a comprehensive approach on migration, setting out legal migration opportunities, selective migration, migration profiling, regularization of over stay, but not amnesty, short-term visas and comprehensive policy determination by categorization of classes of visas.


·                     A two-fold approach can be seen in the Indian context in the perspective of India where managed migration is currently in experimental stages. One set of ideology practices promotion whereas the other thinking is based on regulation of migration. Both follow an educative thought-oriented process. An active Government participation is a must for effective resolution of managed migration at operational levels in both these schools of thought.


·                     The first visualises promotion of migration sees channelized migration programmes. These visualize bi-lateral localised agreements for immigration between sending and receiving countries. A Government bureau in the States of Punjab and Haryana for assisting State residents to route immigration through Government channels with visas facilitation by Visa Facilitation Services will eliminate traffickers with their illegal operations.


·                     The second looks at selective regulation of immigration by a system of checks and balances created and put in the system of migration.


However, a tightening visa regime will deter clandestine illegal operators only if it is coupled with awareness, aids, publicity and education for enabling prospective migrants to take a conscious decision themselves to migrate or not. In India today, with booming economic growth and increasing employments opportunities, it may be necessary to educate the youth whether they need to migrate. In this context, the role of the Ministry of External Affairs and State Governments supported by Foreign Missions to launch an outreach campaign into villages in Punjab where vans, banners, posters, newspapers and other publicity material in Hindi and Punjabi languages to carry the message of Migration-the right way would be extremely beneficial. This may be the second mode of helping all concerned to take a conscious decision for oneself for deciding to migrate or not and thus helping managed migration. Regardless, further loss of human lives at hands of merchants of death must stop.

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LESSONS TO BE LEARNT

Regardless, Parliament must seriously contemplate enacting a national law to control Indian borders to regulate this human smuggling industr

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Contact International Family Lawyer Anil Malhotra
Contact International Family Lawyer Anil Malhotra
Contact International Family Lawyer Anil Malhotra
Contact International Family Lawyer Anil Malhotra
Contact International Family Lawyer Anil Malhotra
Contact International Family Lawyer Anil Malhotra
Contact International Family Lawyer Anil Malhotra
Contact International Family Lawyer Anil Malhotra
Contact International Family Lawyer Anil Malhotra
Contact International Family Lawyer Anil Malhotra
Contact International Family Lawyer Anil Malhotra
Contact International Family Lawyer Anil Malhotra
Contact International Family Lawyer Anil Malhotra
Contact International Family Lawyer Anil Malhotra
Contact International Family Lawyer Anil Malhotra
Contact International Family Lawyer Anil Malhotra
Contact International Family Lawyer Anil Malhotra
Contact International Family Lawyer Anil Malhotra
Contact International Family Lawyer Anil Malhotra
Contact International Family Lawyer Anil Malhotra
Contact International Family Lawyer Anil Malhotra
Contact International Family Lawyer Anil Malhotra
Contact International Family Lawyer Anil Malhotra
© Anil Malhotra, 2021
Contact International Family Lawyer Anil Malhotra
Contact International Family Lawyer Anil Malhotra
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