Human Trafficking
As an investigative journalist, Sudhakar Reddy played a key role in busting the human smuggling/ human trafficking racket in 2017, when scores of construction workers and labourers were lured on the pretext of jobs and illegally migrated to China and gulf countries. He filed many stories on how Indians were duped by fake travel agents and got trapped in these countries without basic amenities or even passports.
In 2018, Sudhakar launched an investigation on the curious case of Andhra and Telangana agricultural laborers who preferred doing menial jobs in Gulf and Iraq over living an underprivileged life in their native places. He exposed the desperation of these migrants to earn a “decent pay check”, even if that involves playing a deadly game of life and death every day. He traveled to some of the villages of Andhra and Telangana like Kadapa, Adilabad, Nizamabad, Morthad and Khanpur, where the migrant crisis is quite high and interacted with many families of the migrants.
He revealed some shocking facts about how youth and middle-aged men and women with poor, illiterate backgrounds are being illegally smuggled to Gulf countries and war zones like Iraq as tourists and later, being forced to do lowly jobs in inhumane conditions.
As part of his investigation, Sudhakar also visited the Indian migrants who landed in Gulf prisons for trivial issues like theft, carrying poppy seeds, consuming banned pain killers etc. Some of them were sentenced to more than 7 years of harsh imprisonment, pushing them and their families into a state of trauma.
He also made a detailed report on the precarious lives of Indian immigrants in Gulf countries who are committing suicide due to forced labor, stress, harassment from moneylenders at home and no escape route from their abusive employers.
Sudhakar also filed a story on 15 Migrants from Telangana who were trapped in Erbil in Kurdistan after their employers confiscated their passports and refused to pay them their wages. He also influenced the Government of Telangana to write to the Consul General in Erbil, seeking for permission to allow the migrants to return home. Sudhakar also interacted with the Gulf NRI Organisations and many NGO’s which agreed to support him in this cause by providing legal assistance and arranging for funds to pay the penalty.
Links:
https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/hyderabad/34000-indians-died-in-gulf-in-five-yrs-1200-from-state/articleshow/72175377.cms
https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/hyderabad/15-migrants-from-telangana-in-iraq-seek-funds-for-exit-permit/articleshow/67597010.cms
https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/hyderabad/jobless-in-gulf-telangana-and-andhra-pradesh-workers-all-set-to-return-home-in-droves/articleshow/75132058.cms
https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/hyderabad/human-traffickers-go-scot-free-in-telangana/articleshow/67733454.cms
https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/hyderabad/conned-by-travel-firm-hyderabad-pilgrims-stranded-in-iraq/articleshow/64442446.cms
http://udumulasudhakarreddy.blogspot.com/2008/01/andhra-poor-brave-iraq-death-trap.html?m=1
https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/hyderabad/34000-indians-died-in-gulf-in-five-yrs-1200-from-state/articleshow/72175377.cms
https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/hyderabad/hundreds-from-telangana-die-in-the-gulf-every-year-many-of-them-kill-selves/articleshow/67733974.cms
https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/amaravati/in-quest-for-a-better-life-3-from-ap-die-in-gulf-every-2-days/articleshow/69965633.cms
https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/hyderabad/t-nri-cell-to-help-workers-in-dubai/articleshow/75363501.cms
https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/hyderabad/double-whammy-no-rehab-plan-for-gulf-returnees/articleshow/75149180.cms
https://www.deccanchronicle.com/nation/current-affairs/010617/human-trafficking-to-china-gulf-on-the-rise.html
