Donkey Route, Indian Stranded in Malaysia & USCIRF Hearing

May

2026

A resident of Chak Tarewala village, Moga district, Amarjit Singh was allegedly cheated of nearly USD 50K by a travel agent and his associates on the promise of sending him to the US. The victim was reportedly pushed through an illegal ‘donkey route’ spanning multiple countries and was kept in camp-like detention conditions. Eventually, he was intercepted by US authorities at the border and placed under custody, spending one year in a US detention facility before being deported back to India on 18 Dec 2026. The main accused have been identified as travel agent Naginder Khullar, along with Kaku Singh and Mangal Singh. The police have launched search operations to arrest the accused. Meanwhile, a 30-year-old man, Aakash, claiming to be an Indian citizen, is stranded at Kuala Lumpur International Airport in Malaysia for two weeks after he was denied entry in Delhi for not being able to present a valid Indian passport. Aakash, who claims to be from Jalandhar, Panjab was turned away after Indian immigration authorities refused to accept the identity certificate—issued by New Zealand (NZ) to asylum-seekers—as a valid travel document to enter India. An NZ Certificate of Identity is a travel document issued to non-citizens who cannot obtain a passport from their home country. This document allows holders to return to NZ and it serves refugees, stateless persons, or residents unable to get a national passport. Concurrently, in a USCIRF hearing on religious persecution in India, the panel stated that religious freedom in the country remains on a downward trajectory. Religious minority communities—Christians, Muslims, and Dalits (marginalized caste)—continue to be the target of violent attacks with several states introducing anti-conversion laws and imposing harsh penalties for religious conversions. Human rights lawyer and law professor based in Washington DC, US Arjun Singh Sethi raised the issue of India's transnational repression in Canada and US. The panel added that the Indian government continues to wield anti-terrorism and citizenship laws to arbitrarily detain religious minorities and those advocating on their behalf. Additionally, New York (NY) authorities under Mayor Zohran Mamdani have relinquished hundreds of artifacts valued at USD 14M to India, which were allegedly ‘trafficked’ into the US and subsequently seized by NY authorities (earlier coverage).