NEW DELHI: In a re-run of the incident that took place in France last year, over 200 Indians who arrived in Jamaica on a chartered flight from Dubai were sent back after a few days as immigration officials were not convinced that they were tourists.
The Ministry of External Affairs confirmed the development. “We are given to understand that a chartered flight from Dubai which landed in Jamaica had several Indians on board. They had prior travel and hotel bookings, but the local authorities were not satisfied. After a few days, they sent the Indians back to the point of origin, which was Dubai, on May 7,” said MEA spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal.
“Indians are ‘monitored nationals’ globally and so (they) are manually processed by an officer upon arrival in Jamaica because of their risk profile,” said a report in Jamaica’s The Gleaner broadsheet.
Local media reported that immigration officials said the Indians, mostly men, had arrived for a five-day tour, but checks of their itinerary revealed coverage for only one day. There were also issues with the travel documents of some of the men. The group was subsequently refused entry, but allowed to remain at a hotel in Kingston on humanitarian grounds till the authorities finalised the arrangements for their repatriation.
In December last year, the French authorities had detained 303 persons, mostly Indians, on the suspicion of human trafficking. As in Jamaica, the French immigration authorities were not convinced that they had chartered a flight from Dubai to Nicaragua purely for tourism. The authorities later sent back 276 passengers to India, while a very few opted for political asylum or continue for Nicaragua.
“The group was transiting through the country, with some of its travellers reportedly destined for Nicaragua in the hope of participating in a major housing development project in the Central American country,” said The Gleaner report. The flight was carrying 253 Indians, German crew members, at least one French citizen, a national of Uzbekistan and a Russian.
The Jamaica’s Ministry of National Security, in a statement, said the flight arrived in Jamaica legally, but the passengers were refused entry by immigration officials, based on security concerns uncovered during their processing at the airport. The ministry was alerted to the operation of the flight, based on what appeared to be anomalies and missing details from its initial permit application.
The ministry said it was also discovered that two passengers did not appear on the submitted passenger manifest. This led to further investigations and a decision was taken not to grant the passengers permission to land in Jamaica.