1 of 62 labourers stranded in Malaysia to fly home tonight: NGO

One of the 62 stranded job seekers from India who was allegedly held captive in Malaysia will return home from Kuala Lumpur by Monday morning, an NGO official said.

Sanjay Mallick (27) would return home to Pandua in Hooghly district, Sheikh Jinnar Ali, the official of the Kolkata-based NGO National Anti-Trafficking Committee said.

The NGO had flagged the plight of the job seekers who had gone to Malaysia.

Ali said the Malaysian police have traced Mallick and recovered his passport, following which he was sent back to India.

Altogether 62 Indians, including 32 from West Bengal, were "sold" by Indian agents to two Malaysian organisations as "slaves" and Mallick was one of them, he said.

"I am waiting at the airport to return home. My employer has dropped me off here. I have no money left," Mallick was shown by vernacular TV channels as saying at the Kuching airport in Malaysia.

The National Anti-Trafficking Committee had sought assistance from the Ministry of External Affairs to rescue all the others who were held captive in Malaysia by the two organisations which had hired them.

The NGO had also written to the Prime Minister's Office and the West Bengal Chief Minister's Office to rescue the people, whose plight came to light through a video shared on social media, Ali said.

In the video, two people from the group claimed that after reaching Malaysia, their passports and visas were snatched and they were taken to Kuching, capital of the Malaysian state of Sarawak.

"The two said that they, along with 23 others, were locked in one room in Malaysia by a casino staff, while seven others were held captive in another room," Ali said.

The group of 32, including two children, hail from districts of North and South 24 Parganas, Hooghly and Birbhum, he said.

Ali said Indian High Commission officials have informed the NGO that Malaysia police have started a probe into the matter and were able to locate their whereabouts at Kuching.

The National Anti-Trafficking Committee had played a big role in bringing back home a few goldsmiths stranded in Iran recently.