The Tough Choices of Unlawful Journeys





    Jagadish (42) was a science teacher in a school in Gujarat's Gandhinagar district. He was married to his fellow teacher Vaishali (39) and they have two children Vihangi (10) and Priyam (5). Jagadish had about 10 acres of land and was earning a decent income from it. One day Vaishali's cousin Kishore who was in America came to his house described his beautiful life in America. Many Indians who did not know how to write letters have built their lives in America and are rich today said Kishore, why are you wasting your life in this small town? He left a worm in Vaishali's head to immigrate to America with his family. Vaishali's desire to immigrate to America was like a budding day. It grew into a tree. She kept pestering her husband about this. Jagadish succumbed to her insistence and went to a travel agent in the capital to find out how to migrate to America. It is very difficult for him to migrate there, he has to wait several years to get a tourist visa. He said that he would facilitate migration to any Gulf nation. Jagadish, who returned to the village, told Vaishali to give up her dream of America. But she didn’t ?

    Vaishali replies, Is it impossible to get an immigrant visa?  That about 15 families have migrated to America and Canada from our town. But a family I know immigrated illegally to America six months ago through an agent and is leading life comfortable there, she said to Jagadish and went to collect information. After a few days she gave the address of an agent saying I will get the information from them and let you know. Both husband and wife contacted the agent. He said sending you  legally is impossible but illegally you can go. It costs a lot of money and is very risky. If you have four members of your family to go, it will cost around one crore rupees.  If you are ready to pay that much money and take the chance of all of you being arrested in America, come here next week with your passports.  Agent said "risk" because he want to know them the reality of illegal journey, and also he said he has sent 23 people to America from this same district, and it gave them courage that there is no problem said the agent.

       Then Jagdish sold his land and arranged the money and approached the agent. I will send you to America through Canada. But getting visa to Canada is not easy. So after a few days I will send you on a trip to Indonesia and then after 3 months to Canada. Agent sent the family to Jakarta and Bali for a 5 day trip. After they returned from there, then the family was sent on a tour to SriLanka. When they returned from the trip, agent  applied for Canadian visa. A travel invitation was given by a person of Gujarati origin in Canada for visa. As soon as they got  Canadian visa, they were sent to Toronto, Canada via Colombo.

    Jagadish and his family met at the Toronto airport by an Indian who took them to his home and asked them to spend two days there. Canada is a very cold country. So he took them all to the shop and gave them warm clothes saying that you all should wear suitable clothes. After that, he was met by another person of Indian origin who told him that he would travel to America border. Next day Jagadish with his family left Toronto in the agent's car. Since it was January, it was too cold in that country that even putting a heater in the car would not have helped. It took about 22 hours to get from Toronto to Emerson. So they all stayed overnight in a small town on the way. The next day they left there in the morning and reached Emerson in the evening. The agent who dropped him off at a hotel there introduced him to seven other Indians who, like them, had come to America without visas.

    Then addressing them all, this town is located on the border of Canada and USA. After driving about 10 km on the same highway, you will reach the US border check post. I will smuggle you into America because you don't have an American visa. There is a river on the border between the two countries. Now that it is frozen, you can easily walk on it and reach America. Tomorrow morning I will touch you to the river bank of our country. After you cross the river, another agent will meet you and take you to the next destination.

       19th January 2022 , 11 Indians, including Jagadish family, left their hotel in an agent's van. Dropping them at a place next to the road, he showed them the path to take and said that if they walk straight on this path for one kilometer, they will reach America. It was a large plain and the cold wind was blowing like a whirlwind. It was -35 degrees Celsius then. (Human body temperature is +37 degree) So the warm clothes they were wearing could not prevent them from that severe cold . There was a foot of snow on the ground and the steps were slippery. Also, they could not walk quickly as they had bags in their hands. Like Jagadish's son, after walking a little distance, he said that he could not walk and asked him to pick up his mother. Meanwhile, the others who were with him quickly moved forward and disappeared. Jagdish encouraged the children that if they walk a little further they will reach the goal and after walking a little further they realized in which direction they were moving. 

    Meanwhile, on the same evening, US Border Protection Force personnel saw 7 Indians walking on the road on their side of the border. They were arrested and questioned because they did not have an American visa. They told the truth, a van had come to take us on this road, in which we were looking for an agent waiting for us. Police found a van parked on the same road. There were three people in it. The driver was an American citizen and the passengers were Indians. Indians also did not have visas. All of them were arrested

    On further investigation, the American police learned that 4 members of the same family were missing from the Indian group of 11 people. A search has begun for the missing family. The next morning, dead bodies of Jagadish and his entire family were found on the Canadian side of the border, 10 meters away from the US border. The cold and the brutal network of human trafficking, a major challenge worldwide, claimed their life. The United States, Canada and India conducted joint operations to find those responsible for the death of the Jagadish family. Police arrested one agent each in their respective countries. One of them has been released while the other has been jailed for two years. The agent in India is in jail awaiting trial.(1)

    Even today Indians have a mindset of looking America has a great place. We Indians think living in America is a best and beautiful life. Once they visit America they think they have achieved something great in life. Many Indians go to America legally and illegally by crossing borders with the help of agents.They spend lot of money to cross the border.  Indians think America can give them good job, good earnings, good school and education to children. And they think once they take risk to cross the border then their generation will lead a satisfied life with proper basic things. Indians think they can earn in double in America comparing to India and they can make more money in their life. So, many people from India cross the border with the help of agents illegally. While crossing border many die and some people lose their family in between because of heavy cold or other weather condition. They have to leave behind the dead body of loved ones and move forward or else they will also die. Its not that much easy to cross the border, as there will be lot of security and surveillance and patrolling.  As we can see in the above case, their desire to live in USA, Jagdish and his family lost the life in middle of the journey because of unbearable cold and the brutal network of human trafficking. In India the above said couples were leading a decent life with their two kids. But their infatuation on America made the whole family a orphan corpse on some unknown country’s border.


Reference

1] Dr.D.V Guruprasad, 2023 October 13, “ವಿದೇಶಿ ಬದುಕಿನ ಮೋಹ ತಂದ ಸಾವು”, A Kshana, Vijayavani, Bengaluru, Page No- II

 2] Image from pinterest


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