Manama T he travel ban of four Pakistani nationals has been lifted as the telecommunication company has waived off their claims after the intervention of Pakistan Embassy. Seven Pakistanis had been put under travel ban because of nonpayment of bills against the electronic devices
Manama
The travel ban of four Pakistani nationals has been lifted as the telecommunication company has waived off their claims after the intervention of Pakistan Embassy.
Seven Pakistanis had been put under travel ban because of nonpayment of bills against the electronic devices they had allegedly purchased from the telecommunication company on installments. But the seven people had always categorically denied it.
Expressing gratitude to Maqsood Qadir Shah, Counsellor for Community Welfare at the Pakistan Embassy, the four Pakistani nationals- Noor Iman, Niaz Khan, Lal Muhammad Khan and Aftab Khan- said that they were relieved as they could fly to their country anytime they wanted.
According to Noor Khan, it was during their usual loitering at the Al Dasmah roundabout in search of a job, an unknown person approached them and offered very good jobs in Alba.
“He offered us handsome salaries - BD400 for driver and BD300 for the labourer,” he said, adding: “How could we refuse such a big offer?”
The stranger took their CPRs in the pretext of making their gate passes. Before returning the CPRs, he had manipulated the documents to purchase costly electronic appliances from the telecommunication company in their names.
The poor labourers could not realise then that they had been conned. It was only six months later that they started receiving calls from the company’s office giving them reminders to pay the installments.
Meanwhile, two of them were stopped at the airport by the officials while they were going to Pakistan, citing that they could not travel owing to nonpayment of bills ranging between BD 628 and BD 900.
When they contacted Pakistan Embassy, the officials helped lift the travel ban on four of the seven labourers. It’s hoped that the issue of remaining three will also be solved soon.
Commenting on the issue, Maqsood Qadir Shah said: “The government had always supported in such cases. But Telecommunications Regulatory Authority (TRA) need to take strong measures and devise such systems that the real culprits could be spotted easily in such cases.”
“They should establish strong check and balance system that nobody would ever be able to cheat in such a manner. After all what is the use of CCTV cameras if they cannot support to solve such cases?” he queried.
He opined that companies should also think before handing over their hi-end products to the common people. “They should not give things blindly and must have a strong verification system,” he suggested.
Shah said that there should be awareness among the people not to hand over their CPRs to others.
