New Delhi: Maninder Pal Singh paid Rs 41 lakhs and travelled for 13 months via a donkey route through Mexico, only to be deported by the United States in December last year. His journey started in 2023, from India to Kazakhstan to Dubai and then to Libya through Senegal. From Libya, he reached Nicaragua, then Honduras and Guatemala, finally crossing into the US from the Mexico border late last year.
After his deportation, he was arrested on arrival at Delhi’s Indira Gandhi International Airport, and this led to the arrest of two agents—Amit Arora, alias Rachit Arora, from Punjab’s Balachaur and Mandeep Singh from Kapurthala—earlier this year.
It unearthed another syndicate involved in sending people to the US through various donkey routes. These are illegal ways in which people from different countries enter other countries either to evade law enforcement agencies or their own country or for want of a better life.
IGI Police arrested 21 agents involved in arranging for donkey travels in 2024. In 2025, so far, 6 agents have been arrested.
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How the matter came to light
The matter first came to light when Maninder Pal Singh landed in Delhi on 12 December 2024. When IGI Police scrutinised his travel documents, it found that some of the pages were missing. They suspected that, like in most cases, the missing pages had fake visas on them.
When the Delhi Police launched an investigation into the matter, it found that Maninder—a school dropout—wanted to go to the US to build a better life. It was in 2023 that he came into contact with agent Mandeep Singh through his friends. Mandeep assured him of travel to the US for Rs 41 lakh.
“Maninder Pal Singh said during interrogation that the agent took the money from him at his office in Kapurthala, Sultanpur,” Deputy Commissioner of Police (IGI Airport) Usha Rangnani said in a statement Friday.
A 13-month long journey
In October 2023, Maninder began his journey by travelling to Kazakhstan, finally, entering the US from Mexico in November last year. “The agents arranged for fake Guatemala visas and Immigration stamps of arrival and departure of some countries to cover up his illegal journey period,” DCP Rangnani said.
On reaching the US, Maninder, following the instructions given to him by the agents, removed the pages from his passport that contained the fake visas and stamps. The tampering, however, caught the attention of the US authorities, and they held him in a detention centre for over a month before deporting him to India.
Based on Maninder’s interrogation, the Delhi Police arrested Mandeep Singh on 11 January this year. Mandeep then revealed Arora’s name, who was arrested in Delhi on 18 February, sources in the police said.
“His (Arora) interrogation revealed that he and his associates had been forging visas and also duping people in lieu of sending them abroad,” the DCP said.
Arora, according to the police, has 10 cases against him in Chandigarh for allegedly forging visas and passport fraud cases.
Delhi Police sources added that Mandeep worked as a sports teacher in a government school and is a former national level kabaddi player.
Constantly changing routes
Donkey agents continuously change routes and destinations to evade the police. Routes decided are dependent on factors such as visa availability, cost of transportation and availability of direct flights.
According to investigators, these agents also proximity and porous borders of Southeast Asian countries such as Thailand, Malaysia and Singapore.
Agents also choose the West Asia route, where there is a demand for cheap labour in countries such as the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia. Once the individual reaches these countries, they are asked to wait as the agents figure out their next destination in order to reach the US.
Trafficking routes into Europe include Poland, Belarus, Greece, and Italy, as well as the border country of Turkey. Agents also make use of the visa-on-arrival facilities to help immigrants enter the US through South American and Caribbean countries like El Salvador, Curacao, Nicaragua, and Suriname, among others.
(Edited by Sanya Mathur)
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