Dunki is an upcoming Bollywood film of superstar Shah Rukh Khan. The treasure of this much-awaited film is now available on many electronic media and social platforms. Most of you are curious about the name of this film, ‘Dunki’. This article will provide a comprehensive explanation of your curiosity. The movie ‘Dunki‘ reflects the real story of donkey flights.
What Are Donkey Flights?
There is no international nomenclature that define “Donkey Flights” as a name. This term donkey flight is mainly used for illegal and undocumented entry into a foreign country. This film explains this illegal and undocumented immigration of people mainly from the region of Punjab, Haryana into the abroad countries like the United States of America, Canada and the United Kingdom. This term ‘donkey flight’ was highlighted when the Migration Policy Institute (MPI) published a report in February 2014. According to this report, Indian immigrants refer to a popular route to the United Kingdom as ‘Donkey Flights’. The term ‘Donkey’ is derived from a Punjabi idiom that means jumping from place to place. It describes a common ploy that immigrants would use in which they apply for a tourist visa to a European Union Schengen country. They can travel freely in Europe’s border-free zone with the intention of leapfrogging over into the United Kingdom using this visa.
Based on current data, the number of undocumented Indians present in the United States is the fifth largest. Same as in the United Kingdom, it is in third position. The spider web of donkey flights has led to the involvement of many people worldwide in the most deadly border crossing activities and the loss of their lives. But the number continues to increase day by day.
The Method Used For Donkey Flights
By using the United States of America as an example, we can understand this entire donkey flight process. The donkey flight process involves selecting a tourist visa from a Latin American country. After reaching there, they crossed the Mexican border to enter the United States of America. Despite our description of this process in two lines, working out it, is not as easy as it sounds. Many people spend their entire life’s income, and many even lose their lives. According to data, 16,200 people were arrested by the local police at the US-Mexico border in 2022, compared to just 9,000 in 2018. Around 97,000 Indians have been arrested while crossing the US border in the past year. Between October 2022 and September 2023, there were a total of 30,010 caught at the Canada border and 41,770 caught at the frontier with Mexico.
The border crossing process is not as easy as seen in many Bollywood or Hollywood action movies. The first step in this process is the capture of young people by travel agencies. The rate of migration is much higher in states like Punjab compared to other states in India. In Punjab, there are numerous travel agencies that promise to provide work or education visas with ease. The business of ‘Donkey Flight’ is widely spread in Punjab, where youths wish to travel abroad and settle down for a good lifestyle. But getting a visa in these countries is not an easy task. The majority of the visas were rejected. In this situation, agents choose the donkey visa method instead of applying for an H1B visa. For this illegal method, the agents charge a handsome amount which may start from 20 lakhs Indian rupees. These agents are also called donkers. They plan a roadmap for the entire process. If we consider the case of the United States of America, the donkers mainly send the person to the nearest Latin American country where free entry or easy to get a visa is possible. One of these countries is Ecuador, where people from India as well as 180 countries can enter without any visa. After reaching Ecuador, they start their journey towards Colombia. After passing Colombia, the immigrants enter into Darien Gap. Darien Gap is one of the ruinest and most dangerous places on the Earth. It is situated in between Colombia and Panama. A deep forest area spread over 10,000 sq. miles. No country’s law is applicable in Darien Gap. Neither roads nor any government help is available here. Most of the immigrants lost their lives during crossing the Darien Gap by the attack of harmful insects and poisonous snakes.Also many were threatened by the local thieves and lost everything there. In this donkey process, Darien Gap is the one and only way to reach Mexico border. The rest of the people from Darien Gap reach this border by the help of local donkers, drug cartels, local hitchhikers and bribing the local police and customs officers.
At reaching the Mexico border, again donkers demand a good amount of money from the immigrants to provide them sub-human conditions to stay near the border area. In this sub-human condition, the immigrants may wait for a week and at the arrival of a suitable condition, local donkers help them to cross the Mexico border. Unfortunately, in many cases, after crossing the border they are detected and attested by the Mexican police. The authority to transfer these undocumented and illegal immigrants to the nearest detention centers where the environment is worse than a local jail. Here the detained persons deman for asylum . Again this process starts from credible fear interviews. In this stage, the asylum seeker needs to convince the authorities about the fear in their country to strengthen their case. Because if the officers detected that you came from your country and crossed the border with dare and knowing all its dangerous effects then they will arrest you and deport the person to his/her own country again and the asylum seeker case will not run any more. But if the authorities believe that it is a true asylum seeker case then they produce the person in front of the immigration judge and hire an advocate to fight the case of that person. At the end , it is decided by the judge, to whom asylum is given and to whom not. But very few get asylum while most Indians are deported back to India. The main cause for this is, in this present scenario, it is not so easy to prove that the person has a life risk in India.
Why Are Donkey Flights Frequent In India?
Illegal immigration from India to the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom is growing day by day. The cases of donkey flights are mostly witnessed in the states of Punjab, Haryana and Himachal Pradesh. Just after the independence of India, this process was started. A slow but continuous migration from Punjab to North American countries like the US and Canada started from those days. Most of the youths from these Indian regions choose this path for a better lifestyle, more wealth and less effort. Many Punjabi Stars, Singers and Rappers make their career in countries like Canada and the US. These fame and wealth inspired local Punjabis to move to these countries and they can take any risk to achieve these. They do not care whether the path is legal or illegal. They believe that the problems on their donkey routa are nothing in front of their golden future. Another reason behind this is the feeling of separatism. You may find Khalistani movement supporters in Punjab but for most of these communities it is easier to operate the movement from outside India. As Khalistan movement is peaking again in recent times, separatists living in Punjab are choosing “Donkey Flights” in a greater number. LGBTQ community also started to prefer this path. Because these communities believe that Indian orthodox society and its laws are not safe for them. It is true that LGBTQ is decreminalized in India but still they think that they have no safe place to live in this democratic country. According to their beliefs, in an open society like America, people will accept them easily. LGBTQ communities feel safe in the US as it is legalised the “same sex marriage”. Along with them, Dalit and Muslim communities due to the fear of discrimination trying to migrate from India.
The United States’s two face policy is also one of the factors in this case. While the US has a very difficult process for work visas or education visas for Indians, illegal immigrants easily get asylum status here. In this policy America is trying to picturize that in India, discrimination is very high and the US helps the victims of these discriminated persons by giving asylum. Here the question is that if the US can grant asylum, then why is it very difficult in its policy to give work visas or education visas? Also, why isn’t America taking any strict action against those donkers who bring these immigrants to its doorstep?
Conclusion
On one hand, India is rapidly growing as an economic power but on the other hand, donkey flights introduce a bad image of India in front of the whole world. A vital reason for this donkey flight is unemployment. As the population is rising, the living requirements are decreasing. For the hope of a better lifestyle, mostly the youths choose to migrate to the US, UK or Canada like countries. To stop this, the central government as well as the state governments should ensure the better living conditions, employment of the youths and take strict action against these donkey flight rackets.
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