Trapped in Libya for eight months,UP man returns home

Jaiswal returned to India along with three Bangladesh nationals,who were working with him in Libya. After reaching Mumbai via Istanbul on October 12,the Bangladeshis took another flight to their country. Jaiswal,after staying with his relatives for three days in Mumbai,took a train and returned home on Saturday.

“I thank God for my safe return from Libya where firing on the roadside was a common sight. Libya is still unsafe,80 per cent citizens still carry guns with them. Firing can take place any time. One has to be very cautious,” said Jaiswal.

Thirty-four-year-old Arvind,a resident of Maharajganj’s Kothibhar locality,had gone to Libya in January,leaving behind his wife Savita Devi and three children,on a two-year work visa.

He said after the tension broke out,people were unsafe even inside their houses. Gunmen forcibly entered houses to hound their rivals. If anyone was found suspicious,they were killed. Shops were looted and vehicles set afire,he said.

Sharing his close encounters,Jaiswal said once he was sitting in his room along with his roommates when four armed men forced their way in and pointed weapons at them. When Jaiswal and others,none of whom could speak Arabic,identified themselves as foreign nationals by making signs,the gunmen left after searching the house.

“A few days later,another group of gunmen came to our house. This time we told them that we hadn’t eaten for the past two days. They gave us food and went away,” said Jaiswal,adding they came to know from local residents that it was a rebellion against Gaddafi’s rule.

Jaiswal said some local residents were kind but they were also helpless because of the lawlessness and shortage of money and food.

“For the last three months,we searched for arrangements the Indian government had made to rescue citizens like me. I regularly called up the Indian Embassy in Libya for help but they never gave any satisfactory reply. I called up my family in India and asked them to find out what arrangements the Indian government had made. They also failed to get any satisfactory reply. We then contacted our company and requested them to help us return to India,” said Jaiswal,who worked as a crane operator at a private company in Libya.

Anxiety had made Jaiswal so sick he had to be hospitalised in September and all expenses were borne by his employers.

Jaiswal went to Libya for work on January 18. He stayed at Jalu’s Miyan Talata area along with eight other employees of the same firm. Jalu is 850 kilometres from capital Tripoli. Three of his associates were Bangladeshis,three Thais and two Nigerians.

About a month later,the anti-Gaddafi movement broke out in Libya and the company was forced to close operations. After Jaiswal’s contact number became unreachable,his family called the Indian Embassy in Tripoli but got no news. The embassy officials said they could do something for Jaiswal if he reached Tripoli or Benghazi airport where arrangements were made to airlift Indians.

In April,Jaiswal managed to contact his family in India and told them that he had very little money left but the company was taking care of their needs. The family asked him to leave Libya as soon as possible. Jaiswal said he did not have enough money to travel to Tripoli or Benghazi and the condition of those staying with him was no better either.

Jaiswal’s family then contacted R P N Singh,Union Minister of State for Petroleum and Natural Gas,who is an MP from neighbouring Kushi Nagar district. Singh spoke to Vayalar Ravi,Minister of Overseas Indian Affairs,and instructed his staff to follow up Jaiswal’s case.

In August,when the situation stabilised in Jalu,the company sent Jaiswal and three Bangladesh nationals to Benghazi,350 kilometres away,on their request. The company also gave them some money.

On reaching Benghazi,they found there was no arrangement to airlift them. They stayed in a hotel for five days and went to Misrata,210 kilometres from Tripoli,to meet the owner of the company. Jaiswal requested the company to arrange for their return to India.

The company asked them to stay at the Misrata camp office till arrangements could be made. All four stayed there for nearly two months. And on October 9,all four persons,including Jaiswal,were sent to Benghazi from where they took a flight to Istanbul,and then to Mumbai.