Quite a few people get detained for unpaid loans or cards
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Hyderabad: Taking loans and leaving a foreign country without settling the same might seem easy, but it can jeopardize one’s future, warn experts. Recently, a native of Kerala was detained in UAE for outstanding loans on a credit card. He now does not know whether he will be deported or sentenced.
It is not rare for Indians working abroad to take loans, phones etc. on credit cards or from banks. “Returning without clearing the dues isn’t tough and we keep hearing of several such cases, but there are instances when people were detained and sentenced for doing the same,” said M. Bheem Reddy of the Migrants Rights Council.
Experts working for migrant rights warn that several white collared employees are being exploited by middlemen and firms who trap them into taking loans and then are forced to flee the country without paying the dues. Mr Bheem Reddy added that there were several cases of white-collar employees being trapped into non-existent jobs. An employee is first told that he will hold a senior post but upon joining, he learns that he has been duped.
“In one such case, the employee was offered a post of a driver, but on paper, the paycheck was shown as that of a senior manager. After a couple of months, the company asked the employee to apply for a loan, take a small share from it and return to India,” Mr Bheem Reddy explained. As the paycheck was of a senior manager, processing of a loan was not a big deal, he added.
Watch out for those mobsters:
After being forced to return to India, Mr Ravi (name changed), a native of Nizamabad who was earlier working in the UAE, claimed that a mafia of agents was cheating innocent migrant labourers.
“When I got the permit to work there, the agent told me that a friend of his needed some medicines which weren’t available in Dubai. I carried the packet given to me by the agent. I was told I would be given a few thousand Indian rupees for doing the job. Once I reached, I was blackmailed by the agent’s friend who claimed that I was carrying banned medicines,” informed Mr Ravi.
Although he was not detained at the Hyderabad or Dubai airports, Mr Ravi had to pay around 1,000 Dirhams to the agent’s friend only to realise later that he had been trapped. Mr Ravi added that he was lucky to have escaped a sentence.
( Source : deccan chronicle )
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