Union Food Processing Industries Minister and SAD’s Bathinda MP Harsimrat Kaur Badal on Wednesday urged the Union External Affairs Minister Dr S Jaishankar to direct the embassy in Iraq to give all necessary assistance to facilitate the return of seven Punjabi youth who were stranded in Erbil city for the last seven months.
Harsimrat, who will be meeting Dr S Jaishankar along with the families of the seven youth on Thursday evening, has written to the
External Affairs Minister to take steps to expedite the safe return of these Punjabis from Jalandhar and Kapurthala districts.
She said that the youth were in dire straits because they could not work for a living due to lack of work permits. SAD, on its part, would pay for the tickets to bring the youth back to their homeland, she said.
Giving a brief about the case, Harsimrat said that the seven youth had been duped by two travel agents who had promised them jobs in Iraq. She said that the agents had taken money to provide the necessary work papers but did not provide any documents to them to make them eligible to work in Iraq.
“The youth had appealed to the State as well as the Central Government to repatriate them as well as demanded action against the travel agents who had left them in the lurch without any identity cards,” she said.
