Human Trafficking in style of Shahrukh Khan’s movie ‘Dunki’; Kathmandu becomes transit for Indian gang

Kathmandu: Bollywood star Shahrukh Khan’s starring movie ‘Dunki’ was released on 21st December 2023. The film was a hit. Mainly, there are two reasons behind the success of the movie. First- Director Raj Kumari Hirani, himself being a brand. Second-The superb story of the movie. 

The story of the movie revolves around people gambling their lives to go to London through an illegal route. The movie was a super hit in the countries, where there is a dominance of people choosing the allegation route to reach the USA. 

The movie narrates the story of the youth, being wrapped up in poverty, and becoming victims of human traffickers, who walk on foot to reach London. The youth, with a beautiful dream to take care of their family, sacrifices hunger and sleep. 

The youth agrees to illegally walk for months, passing rivers, brooks, hills, slopes, and forests to fulfill the dream of living a happy life and generating a huge amount of money. The movie narrates the story of the ‘Dunki Flight’, which is based on the issue of illegal immigration. The story shows how people are choosing illegal routes to reach America, Britain, and Canada from India. 

The movie revolves around how various gangs are converting people into illegal immigrants. The same kind of system is also emerging in Nepal, which is making the story contextual even in Nepal. 

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Dunki is an illegal journey. In this journey, people cross many international borders to reach their nation through illegal routes. The word ‘Dunki’ has been derived from a Punjabi idiom. Its meaning is to move from one place to another. Dunki flight relates to taking people to developed countries like the USA, through illegal routes, by making transit to various countries. 

‘Dunki’ is quite famous in Punjab, Haryana and Gujrat. Travel agencies, Manpower companies, and agents are quite active in those areas, who are active in Dunki flights. Those people take millions and operate ‘Dunki Fights’ for those two who want to visit a foreign land for employment.

The business of ‘Dunki Flight’ is hugely expanded in the regions of Punjab, where a huge population of youths is willing to go to foreign countries. This business has even expanded in Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, and Himachal Pradesh. 

The business started to expand in the western region of India after many people tried to emigrate to foreign lands. Especially, human traffickers target those persons who are seeking good income and lifestyle while conducting ‘Dunki Flight.’ The incidents of ‘Dunki Flight’ are an open secret.

However, it has been revealed for the first time that Indian Human traffickers are using Nepal as a transit. It has been revealed that the Indian gangs created shelter and conducted fraud in Nepal to conduct ‘Dunki Flight’ to foreign countries including America. 

An investigation has found that Indian Mafias were luring people to send them to America from New Delhi through Dubai and Qatar. The Mafias have been also using Kathmandu as a shelter to keep the people willing to emigrate to foreign lands. 

Nepal-A Shelter for Dunki Flight

Just like in Shahrukh Khan’s movie ‘Dunki’, 11 Indian victims of the Dunki Flight were rescued from a house in Kathmandu. Nepal Police even busted 9-members of the gang of human traffickers. Police rescued the victims from the house located in Ratopul, Kathmandu. 

Gurinder Singh, Bhupendra Singh, Man Bir Singh, Jag Deep Singh, Gurpreet Singh, Kuldeep Singh, Rakesh Kumar, Gurpreet Singh and Subash Kunwar, Pratik, and Ashish Kumar of Haryana were rescued. They were brought to Nepal for illegally sending them to America. 

District Police Range Kathmandu Senior Superintendent of Police SSP Bhupendra Khatri said that they received the information that human traffickers made the Indian victims their hostages in Nepal.’Under the ‘Dunki Operation’, the joint team of Gaushala and Kathmandu range conducted a raid on the house. 

Police arrested the main agent for Nepal, who is from Madhya Pradesh, Indu Singh Yadav, Nipun Gupta (from Ludhiyana), Charanjeet Singh (New Delhi), Ashok Kumar (Punjab), Abdul Rah (Mahipalpur), Manish Kumar Malhotra (Punjab), Rabi Mewade (Madhya Pradesh), Ram Chandra Sharma (Rajasthan).  

SSP Khatri said that even a Nepali was involved in the case. He said, ‘The victims were turned into hostages for few weeks. The victims said that they fell into the trap after blindly believing the luring approaches. Earlier, the traffickers have already flown two or three groups to other countries from Nepal.’

House rented for Dunki Flight

According to SSP Khatri, Human Traffickers had rented a whole house to keep the hostages for ‘Dunki Flight.’ The investigation found that the aim of the mafias was not only to send a few to foreign countries, including America but also to commit fraud. 

Police have seized duplicate documents, stamps, laptops, watches, etc from the arrested ones. SSP Khatri said that the human traffickers were using Green Screen to record the videos and changed the background with that of foreign countries. They used the background of Mexico, and Brazil and sent it to their relatives. And even used to set the time of that specific country. 

SSP Khatri said, ‘They used to shoot the videos of the victims on green screen and change the background. They used to make the victims read the scripts like “We are close to America. Even you should come.” And send the videos to other people to scam them.’

The gang has been keeping some hostages for 14 days, some 20 days, and even for months in the house. 

The gang brought the people to Nepal via. air route. The gang collected around 4-4.5 million rupees from the victims to send them to America. Police are investigating the case from the perspective of human trafficking and hostage-taking offenses.

One of the reports of the American Foreign Ministry mentioned Nepal as a transit of the human traffickers. The report mentions human smugglers using Nepal as a transit country for illegal immigration. 

[The Nepali version of the story was published on Feb 3, 2024.]