31 Gujarat workers stranded in Iraq return home

Thirty-one out of the 58 labourers from Gujarat, reportedly held hostage by their employer in Iraq, have returned, BJP MP CR Patil has said.
The efforts of the Gujarat government, which wrote to the Union External Affairs Ministry, helped in bringing back 31 out of the 58 labourers who were held hostage in Iraq by their employer, Patil said.
The labourers who returned last night include 26 from Navsari district and five from Valsad, he said.
"I took up this issue with state Chief Minister Narendra Modi after the matter came to light when seven of the labourers had earlier managed to return from Iraq," he said.

Patil said the priority now is to facilitate repatriation of the remaining 27 workers.
The External Affairs Ministry got in touch with the office of Indian embassy in Baghdad. The officials there contacted the labourers on their mobile phones and swung into action and ensured their early return to their native places in Gujarat, official sources said.

The matter came to light when seven of these labourers, mostly from Navsari, Surat and Bilimora in South Gujarat, managed to return from Iraq.
The labourers had alleged that recruitment agents lured them by promising high-paying jobs as skilled labourers in an Iraq-based firm but confiscated their passports, held them hostage, and forced them to work for hours without even providing proper food.

Later they registered a complaint with Bilimora police of Navsari district against five agents for allegedly cheating them with false promises.
"These five agents include one from Mumbai and remaining four from Navsari. We learnt that 58 labourers are still stranded in Iraq. We have acquired passport details of these workers and sent a report to the state government for further action," Navsari SP Nilesh Jajadia had earlier said.
Satish, a labourer who returned to Navsari, alleged that his employer had deducted dollars 900 from his salary and that they were kept in worst conditions.