Imagine being a poor Indian villager. You’re recruited for an honorable blue-collar job in the Middle East. Your dad borrows money to buy you the ticket. Your travel agent takes pity on you and buys you decent clothes for your first day on the job.

When you arrive, customs searches your belongings. You’re shocked when they tell you they found a small amount of heroin in your shoes and throw you in jail. You quickly realize the travel agent was not as generous as he seemed. You spend the next five years in lockup. The Indian embassy doesn’t help.

One fine day, the police take you out back and cut off your head. Then, while closing out your case, they realize they made a mistake and send a message to the Indian embassy: you were innocent after all. Shrug. Body’s been disposed of. Shit happens. Whaddya gonna do.

Unfortunately, it’s not a macabre short story by Edgar Allen Poe. Naickam Shahjahan, a poor Muslim from Kerala, was beheaded two months ago in Saudi Arabia for a crime he didn’t commit (via Prashant Kothari). 1.3 million Indians work in Saudi Arabia, and 18 were beheaded in 2003. But when innocent Brits are caught in the Saudi sharia system, their government usually manages to get them out.

… an undetermined number of foreigners, among them Indians, have been sentenced to death in the kingdom and await execution. Details of their trials and the evidence presented to convict them are treated as a State secret. “The tragedy is that in many cases, the condemned men did not know they had been sentenced to death, and their embassies were only informed after the fact,” says Menon.

Last year, an Indian diplomat in the Gulf said no advance information is given to the embassy before Indians are beheaded. “We get the information after the execution from local newspapers,” he said. After the execution, the body is not returned to the family. Relatives receive no official information about the location of the mortal remains in Saudi Arabia…

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Yesterday, Vinod reported on the convinction of Hemant Lakhani, would be merchant of death. Lakhani is clearly scum:

Lakhani was filmed clapping his hands in glee as he admired the missile he thought he had single-handedly smuggled into the US and was clearly delighted with his achievement. [cite]

However, I don’t feel any safer today. Consider the following:

1.  Lakhani was a nobody who got set up in a sting.  He wasn’t a big time arms dealer before the FBI came to him, he was a two-time loser in textiles who “had declared bankruptcy, owed taxes on his house, was evicted from the office where he ran his clothing business and owed money on bounced cheques.” From what I can tell, he had no prior involvement with arms dealing, nor any prior association with “terrorists” (it’s in quotes since the FBI guy was a ringer) before the sting.

2.  He was completely incompetent as an arms dealer. Lakhani spent 2 years trying to find missiles to sell to the FBI’s fake terrorist buyer but he still couldn’t get his hands on any weapons. He was so clueless that, according to the fake buyer,  Lakhani was unfamiliar with terms such as ‘ammo’.” His lawyer characterized him as: 

a failed businessman, motivated solely by money who “couldn’t finish a deal if his life depended on it” and would not have done so without a hefty government operation behind him.  [cite]

3.  To make the arrest, the FBI had to supply the arms for Lakhani to sell to them. The FBI supplied both “the arms buyer, and Russian agents who posed as sellers” They even smuggled the “missile” to New Jersey. Before that point, for almost 2 years, the buyer never received any military hardware from Lakhani.

I am not trying to defend Lakhani’s actions. He did something criminal and has been sent to jail. I am simply not convinced that there are any fewer arms or (real) arms dealers in the world today as a result. Continue reading →

Oh simple trader, I hope thee rots in hell –

NEWARK, N.J. (Reuters) – A British man was found guilty of trying to provide material support to terrorists on Wednesday for selling a shoulder-launched missile to an undercover FBI informant posing as an Islamic militant seeking to attack the United States. Hemant Lakhani, 69, a British citizen born in India, was found guilty of five criminal charges by a U.S. District Court jury in Newark, New Jersey, that began deliberating on Tuesday.

His defense – racial profiling –

But while the prosecution depicted Lakhani as an enthusiastic broker eager to supply a terrorist group, the defense said he was a victim of overzealous law enforcement in the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

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This one has it all: Hermaphroditism, incest, sex change surgery, betrayal, and the inevitable lawsuit. Cable executives score their next movie-of-the-week:

Twenty-nine-year-old rubber tapper Kuttiyamma, born with both male and female genitals, had been in love with the relative, Laura, 25, for 15 years before having surgery to become a man and change her name to Binu, the Hindustan Times reported. But Laura became engaged to another man and Binu is suing her for breach of trust after spending 50,000 rupees ($1,150) on the sex change in southern Kerala state. [Reuters/Yahoo!]

Reuters/Yahoo!: He sues lover after sex change hitch

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SM tipster Chai Shenoy, brings it to our attention that there has been a settlement in the discrimination lawsuit against Abercrombie & Fitch. From the New York Sun:

SAN FRANCISCO – A federal judge yesterday approved a $40 million settlement of employment discrimination lawsuits charging that a popular clothing chain, Abercrombie & Fitch, avoided hiring minorities and women nationwide in order to preserve the “all-American look” cultivated by the company in its catalogs and advertisements.

After a brief hearing, Judge Susan Illston gave a strong endorsement to the settlement. In addition to offering cash compensation, the deal requires the company to set up a diversity office and to cease the practice of limiting recruiting to certain fraternities and sororities.

“I think this is excellent work,” Judge Illston said. She heaped praise on attorneys for both the company and the class. The judge also paid tribute to the “courage” of Abercrombie employees who were named plaintiffs in the case. “I do think you’ve done a public service,” she said.

The lawsuits alleged that Asian-Americans, African-Americans, and Latinos who were hired by the company were often relegated to stockrooms where those staffers could not be seen by customers. An attorney for Abercrombie referred questions to the officials at the company’s headquarters, who offered no comment. In court filings, the company has denied any systemic discrimination.

Incidentally, A & F is also known for its T-shirt “humor”, which pokes fun at minority stereotypes.

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A tragic end to the Arvin Sharma search (thanks, SadNepali):

D.C. police say the body of 22-year-old Arvin Sharma was pulled out of the Anacostia River. A passer-by saw a body near the 11th Street Bridge and called police at around 9:45 a.m. this morning. [WJLA]

60 Minutes covered the Anacostia River just yesterday, calling it a dividing line between the Capitol and one of the most dangerous neighborhoods in America:

Police say that so far this year, more than half the murders in Washington were committed here… Anacostia is a neighborhood where unemployment is epidemic and 38 percent of its residents live below the poverty line. [60 Minutes]

The search had been quite intense:

Ashish, Arvin’s 27-year-old brother and roommate, is taking time off work, and the university is spreading the word of Arvin’s disappearance. An aunt is making a trip from Thailand to provide support… “[The family] is taking care of the small things for us,” said Ashish Sharma. “Anyone we call is willing to jump on a plane.”

Arvin Sharma’s younger brother and friends have plastered areas with posters where Arvin might have been seen. “Everyone has been flooding the area with new fliers … Metro stops, gas stations, all the D.C. universities — Georgetown, George Washington and even Howard and Morgan State,” Ashish said. [UMD Diamondback]

Sham marriages with a twist: a London scammer, Jaswinder Gill, was convicted of recruiting female British drug addicts to serve as fake brides (thanks, Sapna):

A woman who is thought to have made up to £1m out of a sham marriage empire has been jailed for 10 years… she told some of the young girls they would work in India as models or in the beauty trade, soliciting for business by handing out cards at London shopping centres… The court was told the women were described as “vulnerable” with at least two of them drug addicts.

One woman was flown to the subcontinent for what she thought was a photo shot. It turned out the “elaborate set” was a proper ceremony which ended with her married to a complete stranger. She was then abandoned to find her own way home. Another who tried to back out at the last minute was threatened with violence and warned she would be raped if she did not go through with it.

… “These marriages were a charade – arranged between perfect strangers who were coached by Gill to convince registrars of their intentions to live as man and wife in the UK.”

Methinks this would make a great Fox show, Who Wants to Marry a Drug Addict? Smile for the camera, honey! You may now kiss your cellmate.

Despite the fact that I get paid the big bucks (I wish) to be a blogging maven and learn desi related stuff first, so that I may humbly bring it to the attention of SM readers, there are some stories that an Indian mom will ALWAYS know about before us savvy internet users. This one comes from first time SM tipster, my Mom. Diamondbackonline.com, a University of Maryland school paper, reports on missing person Arvin Sharma:

A 22-year-old university student was reported missing following an evening of clubbing with friends in Southwest Washington Saturday, officials said.

District Police are looking for Arvin Sharma, a recent transfer from Temple University who lives in Greenbelt. He was last seen near the 1800 block of Half Street near the Lime Night Club, police said. Officials had few details yesterday regarding what may have happened to Sharma or what he was doing when last seen.

Sharma’s family searched his condominium Saturday morning and found his car parked outside, said his brother, Ashish Sharma. He left his car at home Friday evening and rode to the club with friends.

The family has sent e-mails and photos to media throughout the Washington and Baltimore areas, family members said.

“He’s not answering his cell phone; he hasn’t made any withdrawals from his bank account,” Ashish Sharma said.

So why is it that an Indian mom would know about this news first? It’s just the kind of example my mom uses every time I go home to the D.C. Metro area and decide to meet up with some friends in the city. “Be careful, its dangerous.”

My mom also pointed out the fact that the police will attempt to use their brand new anti-terrorism surveillance system, which consists of cameras on practically every D.C. street (more on that here), to figure out what became of Sharma.

Sharma’s family described him as a light-complexioned Indian male with brown eyes and black hair.

He is 6 feet 1 inch tall and weighs about 190 pounds, they said.

District police are asking anyone with information to contact them at (202) 727-9099.

NBC4 has a video report of the story with full details. Continue reading →