ENARADA, Bengaluru, December 5, 2015
By Guruprasad
Two Bengalureans were placed under ‘house arrest’ in Malaysia. Back home, their family members had no clue as to how to rescue them! However, a timely act by a good samaritan and equally timely response by Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) ensured that the two city youths were rescued from the East Asian country and safely sent back to India. The two youths are now back to Bengaluru with all smiles.
We often hear these kind of stories only in the movies but hardly in reality. Well, let’s tell you what exactly happened? By mid-September, two Bengaluru youths; Rajiv Raman Shastri (24) and Prabhu Mohan (23) had dreamt of working in merchant navy. They were soon contacted by an Agra-based consultant by charging a whopping sum of Rs 2.3 lakh. The money was paid but the agent never took interest in sending them. However, following pressure from the youths, the Agra-based agent arranged for their travel to Malaysia and the youths reached their dream destination with a promise of fat pay cheque job in a ship. However, their dreams were shattered when one of the agents snatched their passport while another agent ‘locked’ them in a service apartment for 10 days. The youths were offered food only once in a day and were frequently told to call up their parents demanding ransom. The Malaysian agent’s grouse was that their required money wasn’t transferred from their Indian counterpart and hence the youths would be relieved only if the money was arranged. Meanwhile, the harrowed parents in Bengaluru had no option but to pray as they had already spent all their earnings.
Speaking to Enarada.com, Prabhu Mohan said, “We had contacted an Agra-based consultant in mid-September who took our money in return for a job. So, he made us to stay at Hotel Ved in Agra for a few days and then at Hotel Rajput in Delhi for another week. However, as we kept staying in hotel without any news, we filed a police complaint at Rakabganji police station, Agra. Following the complaint, the agent promised us to return money by handing over a post-dated cheque. Upon returning to Bengaluru, we deposited the cheque which eventually bounced and realised that we were once again cheated. We contacted the agent once again who made final plans to send us to Malaysia. So, we finally landed in Kuala Lumpur with a job that would fetch us $1,450 per month. However, on our way from Kuala Lumpur, the Malaysian agents snatched our passports and locked us in a room. They demanded a ransom of Rs 1.3 lakh failing which, we will never be sent back to India.”
This was when Anil Chalageri, a HR consultant was sipping coffee with his friend at a hotel in Bengaluru. Anil, who soon got to know about the news, decided to act. He threw his hat by sending an email to Minister of External Affairs Ms Sushma Swaraj. However, he little did realise that he would soon get a reply from Indian embassy in Malaysia that too in matter of a couple of hours. Speaking to Enarada, Anil said, “Two youths from Kengeri were locked up in a room. I wrote an email to Ms Swaraj on November 30, 2015 at 12.10 pm and surprisingly, I received an email from High Commission of India’s office, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia by 2 pm the same day. In the mail, the officials said they had already contacted the youths as well as agents and were trying for their release.”
Rajiv R Shastri told Enarada.com, “When we received an email from the Indian High Commissioner’s office, we conveyed the same to our agents. The agents were taken aback. They had never expected such a counter reaction from us and hence released us in a couple of days.” The youths finally left Malaysia and reached India on December 5th evening.
YOU READ IT FIRST AT ENARADA.COM
