Author: Neha, UILS, Panjab University

The yearning for a better life- a universal human aspiration- has fueled global migration throughout history. This dream has become a nightmare for a growing number of young Indians along a surreptitious and dangerous global pathway known as “Donkey” or “Dunki” route. A young man from Kurukshetra, Haryana, recalling his bid to migrate, said that his agent has promised to send him to Italy for 12 lakhs. They first sent him to Dubai and then to Egypt and told him that he will be sent to Libya from where he will have a direct flight. Though he managed to reach Libya, he soon found the cost was too great - landing in jail shortly after. One day he suffered a heart attack in jail. Thought to be dead, he was thrown on the sand outside. "The people in the jail protested seeing me like this and tried to break the jail. Then I was taken to the hospital. As soon as I came to my senses, I was taken by the people of the Embassy and after making a white passport, I was brought to India," he said.

Recently a major Bollywood film was released which showed a stark reality of thousands who risk their life savings, freedom, and even their lives. The migrants are exposed to exploitation, violence, and deportation, the route reveals systematic vulnerabilities in international legal frameworks, unequal implementations of anti-smuggling measures, and the absence of safe migration channels.

This article delves into the mechanism of Donkey Route, the complex extortion networks that thrive on it, and the devastating legal and financial fallout for the aspiring Indian migrants caught in its unforgiving grip.

KEYWORDS:

Donkey Route, Dunki, Migration, Human-trafficking, Extortion, Abuse, Travel Agents, Smuggling, Transnational, Organized Crimes, Human Rights, Violation

The word “Dunki” is a Punjabi term for illegal immigration. It refers to a risky and unlawful method for entry into countries like the US, Canada, UK, etc., without necessary legal travel documents. It is a euphemism for irregular, multi-stage migration pathways used by Indian nationals seeking unauthorized and unlawful entry into other nations. 

THE GEOGRAPHICAL ROUTE-

The journey is diligently planned but brutally executed. A typical route to the U.S. spans several months which begins in India, generally from the states having high rates of youth-unemployment, agrarian distress, like Punjab and Haryana, where local brokers solicit fees ranging from Rs. 30 lakhs to 40 lakhs by guaranteeing employment and asylum overseas. Migrants are generally flown to countries with lenient visa requirements, often in Latin-America, such as Bolivia, Brazil, and other Central American States. The journey transforms into an arduous overland passage when the migrants travel northwards, often by boat, bus, or on foot, crossing multiple national boundaries, relying on a chain of local smugglers. The most life threatening segment is the Treacherous Darién Gap, a virtually lawless, roadless, and dense jungle that separates Colombia and Panama. Migrants spend days crossing this brutal terrain, facing extreme physical challenges, endemic disease, animal attacks, and are entirely at the mercy of the criminal organizations that control the passage. Robbery and sexual assaults are common. Those who survived then continue through Central America to Mexico where they are taught to cross the final border. Sometimes they are advised to surrender to US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agents to file for asylum. This process is lengthy and carries a high risk of deportation.

EXTORTION, HUMAN-TRAFFICKING AND THE AGENT NETWORK:

The financial liabilities are devastating for drunken migrants. The overall cost ranges from Rs. 30 lakhs to over 1 crores. Many families mortgaged agricultural holdings and other assets on high interest loans to finance the route. Those migrants who were apprehended by the CBP are immediately deported and they have to spend their remaining life with unemployment and financial burden. They became a social stigma of failure. Generally, the agents who organized the journey disappear for their life.

THE MECHANISM-

The network of Dunki was operated among the Brokers, the Financiers and the Donkers. The brokers generally operate in towns and villages. They make big and fake promises of employment and asylum abroad, soliciting massive amounts from the migrants and their families. The financers are the main masterminds who organize forged documents and coordinate the movement of migrants across multiple nations. Then comes Donkers who are generally local middlemen operating on the ground in Latin America and Mexico. They guide migrants for their day-to-day transit. They are the direct source of physical extortion and abuse.

EXTORTION AND ABUSE ALONG THE WAY-

While the primary crime is smuggling migrants, the journey also devolves into human trafficking and exploitation for labor, sex, or debt bondage, etc. Migrants are often kept in high-risk scenarios, where they become easy targets for local criminal gangs. In some cases some additional payments were also demanded from the migrants mid-journey. The high-interest loans taken by the migrants in India turn them into indebted, helpless commodities, forcing them to suffer sexual exploitation, violence, robbery and forced labor, just to survive through the journey.

Prosecuting transnational organized criminal groups involved in smuggling and trafficking is difficult due to the global, clandestine, and high-profit nature of the operations. These crimes are highly structured and adaptable due to rapidly changing routes, methods, and communication, making law enforcement efforts to dismantle them slow and reactionary. In many trafficking cases that begin as smuggling, the victim may have initially consented to a job or the journey. Prosecutors must prove that the initial consent was nullified or that the subsequent means (coercion, debt bondage, withholding documents) led to the purpose of exploitation, which can be legally complex. There is always a fear of retaliation and deportation among the migrants which results in non-disclosure of the abuse they suffered, and became the major challenge against prosecution.

"I saw one man drowning in the sea and another falling into a gorge and dying. Leaving the sick and injured behind seemed to be the practice. I saw dead bodies while passing through the jungle of Panama," said Harwinder Singh from Hoshiarpur's Thali.

This is an example of the tragedies that occurred through their journey. Migrants risk drowning in swollen, crocodile-infested rivers, falling from cliffs in the mountain terrain, and succumbing into dehydration, starvation, and endemic disease. While overall fatality number is hard to ascertain for Indians specifically, the sheer number of bodies found was over 124 between 2021 and 2023 by Panamanian authorities.

After having paid large sums, migrants are repeatedly robbed of any remaining cash and documents. Reports from organizations like Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) documented a shocking rise in sexual violence, including rape, against women, girls, and even men, often committed by armed criminal groups in specific, targeted tents. Survivors are often reluctant to report due to stigma and fear of delaying their journey.

As the migrants exit the Darien gap and travel through Central America and Mexico, the primary threat shifts from environmental dangers to human predation including kidnapping of large groups of migrants by criminal organizations in Mexico, extortion and ill-treatment by police and immigration agents, debt bondage and forced labor.

Upon reaching the intended destination, typically the US Southern border, the migrants face the full force of immigration law, where their human rights may be compromised by the system itself. Migrants who are apprehended or surrender at the border are immediately placed into US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention facilities. Due to the complexity of their route and lack of lawful documents, Indian migrants face prolonged detention, sometimes more than a year, as they await asylum hearings and deportation proceedings. While entitled to file for asylum, migrants have limited access to legal counsel as there is a language barrier because of which they may not fully understand the complex legal procedure. Many migrants miss their court dates or fail to present their case due to fear of deportation.

The final consequence for those, whose claims for asylum fails, is deportation which leads them to suffer a very humiliating experience stripping of their dignity and returning in handcuffs and shackles on chartered flights. They are treated as criminals despite being victims of smuggling and exploitation. Deportation and failure often leads to depression and suicidal thoughts. The debt on their family leads to poverty which is worse than their condition before drinking.

The primary legal tool for prosecution is the IPC, specifically section 370 IPC which defines trafficking, including the acts of recruiting, transporting, harboring, transferring, or receiving a person using threats, force, coercion, abduction, fraud, or deception for the purpose of exploitation and section 420 which is often used against recruiting agents who take money based on false promises of jobs or visas.

The Emigration Act, 1983, mandates that any individual or agency recruiting Indian citizens for overseas employment must be a Registered Recruiting Agent (RRA) under the Ministry of External Affairs. Section 24 of the act makes it an offence to recruit people without the required registration certificate

The MEA’s eMigrate portal and the MADAD portal are the mechanisms established to help potential migrants in verifying registered agents and also to complain against fraudulent operators, demonstrating the government’s efforts to channel migration legally.

The United Nations Conventions Against Transnational Organized Crimes (UNTOC) and its two supplementary protocols - Protocol on Trafficking in Persons (TIP Protocol) and Protocol against the Smuggling of Migrants by Lands, Seas, and Air (SOM Protocol) are the main bodies who deals with the issue globally.

GAPS: LACK OF ENFORCEABLE REGULATORY REGIME IN INDIA FOR TRAVEL AGENTS-

The lack of centralized and stringent laws in Punjab, Haryana and other states having high rates of dunking, has spurred the state government to act and make laws but the implementation still remains a major problem. The Government of Haryana introduced the Haryana Registration and Regulations of Travel Agents Bill, 2025, which attempted to fill the Central Government’s regulatory gap. Despite the necessity and strength of the Bill, the ultimate failure lies in enforcement, the state government failed to frame and notify the rules for its implementation. 

The issue of irregular migration via the Dunki route necessitates a multi-layered approach to accountability, encompasses the criminals who profit, the state actors involved, and the migrants themselves. The primary accountability for the atrocities and financial ruin rests with the transnational criminal networks that orchestrate the Dunki route. State accountability is defined by international human rights obligations and bilateral agreements. While the migrants are primarily victims of fraud and exploitation, they also bear accountability for the initial act of seeking unauthorized and unlawful entry, violating the immigration law of the transit and destined country, and intentional use or forged or fraudulent documents. This results in detention and deportation and makes legal entry into the US, Canada, or other countries extremely difficult or impossible.

WHAT INDIAN STATES ARE DOING-

State police forces, in coordination with NIA and ED, have stepped up enforcement against the local networks. State police in Punjab and Haryana are conducting widespread raids to dismantle the local operations of travel and visa agents. Hundreds of individuals have been arrested who solicit money by making false promises of jobs, or illegal entry into countries like the US. 

WHY YOUTH RISKS-

The primary and main reason is the financial and economic crisis at their home land and the better opportunities outside. Structural economic issues like high unemployment, underemployment, job scarcity, etc. forces youth to pay massive amounts to the agents for their migration.

The Dunki route is now a matter of significant national security and socio-economic concern for India, considering its diplomatic relations with the US and Canada. The immediate focus must be on reducing Dunkirk immigration by aggressively targeting the fraudulent brokers or agencies. India should make bilateral agreements and Memoranda of Understanding (MoUs) with countries like the US and Canada, specifically to create safe and legal migration pathways for the: low-skilled and semi-skilled workers from agrarian regions.

The ED and NIA have launched aggressive probes, arresting key operatives and cracking down on the financial crimes and money laundering associated with the trafficking syndicates. The MEA has blacklisted thousands of unregistered recruiting agents to curb the source of the deceit. Public awareness campaigns have been organized in towns and villages to caution people about the extreme dangers of Dunki. The government has also strengthened cooperation with foreign governments for intelligence sharing and counter-trafficking efforts. 

SHOULD STATE INTERVENE MORE STRONGLY-

The ethical answer is Yes, but the intervention must be focused on providing legal alternatives, not on restricting the youth's fundamental economic ambition. The balance will be achieved only when the risk of journey is minimized through legal enforcement and the opportunities are maximized through policies and enactments. 

The Dunki route is a moral challenge not only to our nation but also to the international community. The challenge, however, is fundamentally structural. 

Youth will continue to seek earning opportunities abroad until domestic opportunities expand significantly. The shortage of legal migration channels and their expensive process additionally make the youth go with illicit manners.

Unless the nexus of poverty, unscrupulous agents, and lax cross-border regulation is addressed, the “donkey route” tragedies will continue.

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