More than 100 Pakistanis, mostly belonging to Multan and Dera Ghazi Khan, have appealed to the president of Pakistan and federal interior minister to help in taking them back home from Malaysia.
In messages receiving here, they said human smugglers in Pakistan had got Rs 150,000 from each job seeker for Malaysia and left them at the mercy of employers there, who were forcing them to do job for 16 to 18 hours against merely 900 Ringgit (Rs 15,300) per month.
According to them, they had signed salary package of 1600 Ringgit (Rs 27,200) per month for serving only eight hours. In a message, Sajid Mumtaz of Multan said that they were recruited in Pakistan for readymade garments against 1600 ringgits and other benefits as per labour laws but the situation in Malaysia was totally different.
He said now they were unable to come back because their passports and travel documents had been with agents. Apart from this, they could not go to police authorities to remove their grievances.
He said prices of daily use items and food were very high in Malaysia and their survival in this situation was quite difficult.
Two students Mehmood Nawaz and Waqas said that they had paid admission fee plus Rs 150,000 each to agents, who were responsible to arrange admissions in the proposed education institutions. When they went to the institutions they demanded admission fee of 5200 ringgit (Rs 88,400) and informed the students that their admission fee and other expenses were not deposited to them by agents. Though police had arrested him, he was released, as he has a political backing of the ruling party.