Agra: A letter by the Agra district administration, acting on the complaint of a man who alleged his 19-year-old son was being held ‘captive’ in the west African country of Sierra Leone, has been forwarded to the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA), sources in the Uttar Pradesh Department of Home and Confidential told ThePrint.
The family approached authorities a few days back with an application, said Assistant Commissioner of Police (Chhatta) Hemant Kumar, adding that the teenager, Abhishek, emigrated to Sierra Leone in July this year.
He signed a contract with a recruitment agency, which is now demanding money from the family to let him return before the maturity of the contract, said Kumar.
District Magistrate Aravind Mallappa Bangari told ThePrint that conditions under which Abhishek emigrated to Sierra Leone are under investigation. UP government’s foreign ministry coordination department was seized of the matter, he added.
ThePrint reached MEA for comment but had not received a response by the time of publication. This report will be updated if and when a response is received.
According to the man’s father, a factory worker and resident of Agra’s Trans Yamuna colony, they sent the 19-year-old to Sierra Leone at the suggestion of neighbours who went there for work. Abhishek was hired to work for Pradeep Gajwani, originally from Rajasthan’s Ajmer, who runs a shop selling building material in Freetown—capital city of Sierra Leone.
Gajwani, said the man’s father Alok Sharma, had promised to pay Abhishek Rs 20,000 each month, besides taking care of his food and boarding. Abhishek sent back one month’s salary but that was it, said the father, adding that whenever they spoke to him after the first month, the teenager complained that his employer was a drunk who mistreated him. But, the family insisted that he do his best to remain on good terms with Gajwani.
On 15 December, Abhishek’s brother Karan received a call from Gajwani who allegedly told him that he was holding the man ‘captive’ and would implicate him in a false theft case if the family did not pay him Rs 5 lakh. The father claimed they approached Agra Commissioner of Police J. Ravinder Goud who referred them to an ACP-rank official who, in turn, advised them to pay Ganjwani—which they said they couldn’t afford to do.
On Tuesday, the father, accompanied by Etmadpur MLA Dharampal Singh, went to the Agra Collectorate to plead his case before the district magistrate. Singh told ThePrint they met the district magistrate who reached out to the foreign ministry.
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