Two held in Punjab for trafficking people to Cambodia

Chandigarh: The Punjab Police’s Cyber Crime Division has arrested two travel agents for trafficking people from the state to Cambodia and other South East Asian countries, Director General of Police Gaurav Yadav said here on Wednesday.

The accused have been identified as Amarjeet Singh, owner of Visa Palace Immigration in Mohali, and his accomplice Gurjodh Singh.

As per information, the arrested travel agents were sending people from Punjab to Cambodia, promising them data entry jobs. On arrival at Siam Reap in Cambodia, their passports were taken away from them and they were forced or tortured to work in cyber scamming call centres to target people to commit financial fraud.

DGP Yadav said following the information from a victim, who managed to escape from Cambodia after getting in touch with the Indian Embassy, the state Cyber Crime Police Station had registered a first information report and started investigations in this case.

He said preliminary investigation has revealed that the accused have fraudulently sent many people to Cambodia and other South East Asian countries, where they are forcibly made to work at centres engaged in cyber scamming Indians.

The details of the people, who are in cyber slavery, are being obtained and contacts are being established with them and their families, he added.

Sharing details, ADGP (Cyber Crime) V. Neeraja said police teams led by Inspector Deepak Bhatia conducted a raid at the office of Visa Palace and arrested both the accused.

She said the accused have revealed that they were carrying on these illegal activities in connivance with other agents belonging to different states.

She exhorted the people to be aware of such fraudulent immigration activities and not fall prey to the fake promises of travel agents offering lucrative job opportunities abroad.

Meanwhile, the Ministry of External Affairs has set up an Overseas Workers Resource Centre as a single-window facilitation centre to provide support services to people desirous of going abroad for employment.