Indians stranded in Iran to return in a week

Two Indian employees of a power engineering company, who were stranded in Iran due to missing travel documents, will return in a week's time, an official of the Goa-based company said Monday.

Mohammed Khan and Sanket Pandya were left without their passports and travel documents by accident and the Indian mission in Tehran was in the process of giving them new documents, Atul Pai Kane, managing director of Power Engineering (India), told IANS.

"There was no crisis. They are being given new travel documents by the Indian embassy there. They should be back in India in a week's time," said Kane, who also heads the Goa chapter of the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII).

The two Indians had gone to Tehran Jan 10.

Kane said his company had supplied some transformers to a customer in Iran and the two officials had gone there to complete that job.

"They had handed their passports and visas to the customer for extension of their visa, but the person who took the documents quit the job midway. That caused the confusion," he said.

Kane dismissed reports of a crisis, saying the external affairs ministry and authorities in Tehran were in constant touch over the issue.

"They were not detained in any way," he said.

When contacted, Khan's brother-in-law Zafruddin Khan said the duo have been shifted from the guest house, located 50 km from Tehran, to a lodging facility near the Indian mission in the Iranian capital.

Officials of both the Indian and Iranian companies were scheduled to meet Monday in Dubai to sort out the issue, he said.

Media reports quoting Pandya's relatives said his passport was seized by Iranian officials and that his movement was restricted.

Pandya's relatives had also knocked on the doors of Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi, Congress president Sonia Gandhi and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to intervene in the matter.