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Journalism of Courage
When a United States military plane carrying 119 illegal immigrants touched down at Amritsar airport at 11.30 pm on February 15, among the deportees from Punjab was Manpreet Singh, 18, from Miani village in Hoshiarpur district, whose bid to achieve the ‘Great American Dream’ lasted barely a month.
“He went to the United Kingdom a month earlier and an agent sent him to the US from there on January 23. However, he ended up in a detention centre. We had spent nearly Rs 60 lakh to send him to the US. Manpreet’s father lives in France, while his mother and siblings live in the village,” says his uncle Winkel Singh.
Three US military planes carrying hundreds of illegal Indian immigrants have landed at Amritsar airport so far, under US President Donald Trump’s crackdown on undocumented migrants. But in Miani village — with just over 7,000 residents (mostly women, children and the elderly), thriving Western Union outlets, currency exchangers, pizza parlours and lavish bungalows that host their owners just once a year — deportation is hardly a deterrent.
This village in Hoshiarpur district wears its moniker of ‘Mini America’ — over the sheer number of its residents who have migrated to the US, many of them illegally — with pride.
Nearly 40% of the families in the village have moved abroad successfully since the 1970s and 90% of its current occupants have at least one relative in the US, Canada, Australia or Europe. Despite the deportations, the long separation from family, the risks involved in taking the dunki (illegal) route, nothing has slowed the steady flow out of Miani.
Take Kulwant Singh, 60, who took the dunki route to the US in 2001. Recruited into the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) in 1985, Kulwant switched over to the Punjab Police in 1990 and stayed on for over a decade. Since his family owned no land, he says he felt “financially stagnant” and set his sights on the US in 2001, paying an agent Rs 10 lakh to take him to the country.
“I took a day off from work and left my family — wife and three children — behind. From Delhi, I flew to Cuba and Jamaica before landing in Miami 30 days later,” he says.
As soon as he set foot in the US, Kulwant was detained for 20 days. “I filed for asylum, but my plea was rejected in 2006. I was deported and sent to Tihar jail in Delhi for 20 days. I was released after furnishing a bond of Rs 50,000,” he says.
Despite these setbacks, he says he made the best of his time in the US. “I worked at fuel stations while my plea was awaiting hearing. Besides repaying my Rs 10-lakh debt in a year, I managed to earn enough to build a house in my village and give my children quality education. None of this would have been possible on a policeman’s salary,” he says.
Deported from the US in 2006, he says he could not travel abroad for the next five years. “By 2010, two of my children were in high school. So I went to the UK on a visitor visa and stayed back illegally for 14 years. Working on construction sites in the UK paid for my children’s schooling, my daughter’s wedding (Rs 30 lakh) and for sending both my sons to Canada (Rs 40 lakh) for further studies,” says Kulwant, adding that by the time he turned himself in 2023, he was a content man.
Like Kulwant, the thread that binds nearly all of Miani’s illegal immigrants is their aspiration for a “better life”. Listing a few “primary” reasons behind the exodus from the village, sarpanch Gurpreet Singh says, “Earlier, it was to escape poverty. Now, it has to do with escaping corruption, unemployment, drugs and lack of development… There is also envy over neighbours who move abroad successfully. Going abroad is a matter of status too.”
Like Kulwant, Wasan Singh, who has studied till Class 10, was encouraged to move abroad by his friends. His teary-eyed mother Joginder Kaur, 60, says, “We took a loan of Rs 50 lakh to send him to the US seven years ago. He travelled for five months, before entering the US from Mexico and applying for asylum. I miss him, but I want him to settle there permanently.”
Mahinder Singh, 80, who owns an acre, says he sent his elder son, Lakhwinder Singh, to the US 11 years ago via the dunki route. “He was into drinking and drugs, so I took a loan of Rs 32 lakh to send him aboard. With his earnings we have repaid that loan and bought our own land too. Lakhwinder’s son was born soon after his departure, but has never met him because his father still doesn’t have US citizenship.”
Elsewhere in Miani, Baljit Kaur talks about her husband Lakhwinder who spent Rs 45 lakh to enter the US in 2018 via Europe. In New York now, Lakhwinder works at a grocery store. Baljit, who lives in the village with their children, says the family’s situation has “improved greatly” since Lakhwinder reached the US. “We don’t own land, but the money he sends home helps us live here comfortably though we haven’t seen him in six years,” she says.
Kuljinder Singh, who runs a travel agency in the village, says he books around 50 air tickets to various countries. “Around 30% of these travellers are from Miani itself and the rest from surrounding villages. The dream of moving abroad is so deeply ingrained in the hearts and minds of the people, especially in Miani, that they will go to any lengths to reach the country of their dreams,” he says.
Despite the deportations each year, the villagers will continue to try and move abroad, he says. “If one family member is deported, the other tries to migrate. Most people borrow money to migrate. There is no shortage of moneylenders, who charge high interest rates and know that they will eventually be paid back,” he adds.
Varinder Singh Multani, who runs a local news channel in the village, recalls a local lore — the migration story of one of their own, who moved to the US legally in the early 1980s and is now “one of the richest Punjabis there”. It’s a story that fuelled many dreams and successive migrations out of Miani.
Over the years, Miani residents have ended up in many other lands of opportunity. Sukhwinder Singh, now 42, was just 16 when he took the dunki route to France in 1999. “I reached Moscow, from where I walked in heavy snow for three months and reached Germany. Eventually, I settled in France. I worked on construction sites and became a permanent resident in seven years. I returned home, got married, and helped my brothers settle in France too,” says Sukhwinder, who was on a visit to Miani village, even as his three children and wife were in France.
Like Sukhwinder, Raman Singh, 52, took a harrowing route to the UK in 2010. “I hid in a tralla (a large goods truck) for 48 hours without food and water. The tralla was on a ship crossing over from Belgium,” he says, adding that he spent several months in a detention centre before being deported in 2012.
Now working as a mason in Miani village, Raman sent his elder son, then 17, to Germany three years ago. “I didn’t want him to get dragged into the drug culture here,” he says.
Satnam Singh, 39, says he was 13 when he went to New York in 1999 on a visitor visa. “I joined my relatives and worked very hard for the next 13 years. I eventually started a construction company,” he says.
