Travel agency owner, two others arrested over alleged human trafficking
The Criminal Investigation Department (CID) of the Dhaka Metropolitan Police has arrested three alleged members of a human trafficking racket, including the owner of a travel agency, from the capital's Paltan area on Monday (6 May).
The arrestees are Ibrahim Mallik Nahid, 35, owner of travel agency Jannat Trade International, Sharmin Hossain Laboni, 36, and Arifur Rahman Sadi, 24, according to Md Azad Rahman, additional superintendent of police (media) of the CID.
They have allegedly trafficked multiple people to Kyrgyzstan through Ibrahim's travel agency and embezzled crores of taka from more than a hundred victims with promises of lucrative jobs in Kyrgyzstan, the CID official said citing preliminary investigation..
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The trio have been arrested in a human trafficking case filed by some of their victims with the Paltan Police Station. Filing a money laundering case against the arrestees is also underway.
Luring victims with YouTube advertisement
According to CID Additional SP Azad, the accused advertised on video-sharing platform YouTube offering well-paid jobs with free accommodation in Kyrgyzstan in return for Tk5 lakh.
"I sold my house, a cow, and took a Tk2 lakh bank loan to pay the travel agency. When I went to the airport, I found out that I was given fake documents."
The advertisements, posted using a channel of Jannat Trade International, promised to send aspirant expatriates with working visas for car washing jobs with salaries up to Tk65,000, stated Azad.
The advertisement attracted multiple victims, including the plaintiffs - Sona Mia, Akash and Akhter - of the human trafficking case filed against the arrestees.
Each of them paid Tk5 lakh to Jannat Trade International with hopes of going to Kyrgyzstan. They even got their visas and air tickets soon after too, according to Azad.
"On 7 April, they went to the Dhaka airport for their flights to Kyrgyzstan. However, they were stopped by Immigration Police as there was no data regarding their visas on the police database," he said.
The aspirant expatriates later contacted Jannat Trade International but the agency failed to give any satisfactory explanation, which led the victims to file a human trafficking case with the Paltan Police Station on 24 April.
Speaking to The Business Standard on Tuesday, Sona Mia said, "I sold my house, a cow, and took a Tk2 lakh bank loan to pay the travel agency. When I went to the airport, I found out that I was given fake documents."
"Now I have to live in someone else's house. I am failing to support my family while paying the instalments for the loan," he added. "I wanted to be rich. Now, my situation is like a beggar in the street.
