Mangalore: A major human trafficking racket was busted when 84 Sri Lankan refugees were saved at the Mangalore port today. They were rescued from the clutches of around 14 persons who were trafficking them from Mangalore to Australia.

Explaining the racket, Inspector General of Police, Prathap Reddy told the press that the persons were posing as agents and had promised these Sri Lankan refugees of better job opporutnities in Australia.


Among those arrested are C Dinesh Kumar (27), Rajeev Gandhi (28), Maria Jamsan (22), Shivakumar (28), S RAvichandran (30), Shajahan (33), Mahendran (41), S Suresh (26), Thavarassa (46), Mariya Siran (33), Siraj (37), Yakoob (40) and Saleem (28).

These people disguised as agents lured the 84 refugees of better employment, foreign citizenship. The 84 refugees include 22 are women, 56 men and 6 children belonging to 23 different refugee camps in Tamil Nadu, he said.

He said that the accused bought a boat registered by the name ‘Shri Raksha’ from a person in Chitrapura by paying Rs. 11.5 lakhs. The police found 6000 liters of stored diesel and a huge quantity of food stuff on board. They also confiscated Rs 2,84,000 in cash, 10 mobile phones and identity cards of refugee camps.

During interrogation, it was learnt that the agents had tried to send these refugees to Australia on two earlier occasions through the state of Kerala but their attempts failed.

Pointing out other such incidents, he said in the year 2011, 7 cases of human trafficking were traced across India, mainly from Tamil Nadu and in the year 2012, 13 more cases were found till August. However, this is the major case of such a type, he said.