India on Wednesday said it has so far rescued around 45 Indians trapped in fake job rackets in Myanmar.
Giving out details here, MEA spokesperson Arindam Bagchi said that 13 of these Indians have reached Tamil Nadu. "Thanks to the efforts of @IndiainMyanmar & @IndiainThailand, around 32 Indians had already been rescued. Another 13 Indian citizens have now been rescued, and reached Tamil Nadu today," tweeted Bagchi.
He said some more Indian citizens were rescued from their fake employers and are in the custody of Myanmar authorities and that legal procedures to ensure their repatriation at the earliest have been initiated.
Details of the agents allegedly involved in this job racket have been shared with relevant authorities in various states in India for appropriate action,” he said. Bagchi reiterated that India has been actively pursuing the case of Indians being trapped in fake job rackets in Myanmar. The victims were allegedly taken across the border illegally to Myanmar in most cases and were forced to work in captivity in harsh conditions. Bagchi also said similar instances have been reported from Laos and Cambodia and the Indian Embassies in Vientiane, Phnom Penh and Bangkok are helping in the repatriation procedures.
Last month, the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) had issued an advisory against false job rackets offering jobs to entice Indian youth for the posts of digital sales executives and marketing executives in Thailand by dubious IT firms. These IT firms, according to MEA, are engaged in call-centre shams and cryptocurrency related fraud and have been noticed by the Indian Missions in Bangkok and Myanmar.
It also suggested that many of the aggrieved people received these job offers via social media platforms or other sources. The MEA advisory further noted, “The target groups are IT skilled youth who are duped in the name of lucrative data entry jobs in Thailand through social media advertisements as well as by Dubai and India based agents.”
The MEA also urged job applicants to verify the antecedents and present credentials of the foreign employers and companies through concerned Indian Missions abroad before travelling on tourist/visitor visa for employment purposes and/or taking up a job offer. It also advised people to verify the past record of recruiting agents.