Passengers of a delayed Malindo Air flight to Dhaka were waiting at the boarding lounge of the Kuala Lumpur International Airport-2 (KLIA2) in the early hours of last Thursday. Most of them were exhausted by the long wait.
Suddenly, they saw three uniformed men herding a group of people to the boarding lounge. The law enforcers briefed the airline officials and left the place after about five minutes. The members of the group were illegal Bangladeshi workers who had been rounded off by the Malaysian immigration and dumped into different detention camps. As their relatives back home sent air tickets, the Malaysian government decided to deport them.
 The ill-fated workers were in a terrible shape. Some were in their under-garments and a few of them bore the marks of physical torture. Many were not in a position to talk.
However, a few regular Bangladeshi passengers were visibly moved by the pitiable state of the migrant workers and tried to console the latter.
The stories narrated by a few of the migrant workers are not anyway different from the workers very often get cheated by manpower agents.
Some of them had spent a few weeks and some others a few months in detention camps. They all, however, alleged unfair treatment at the camps.
Abdul Momen of Baburhat under Narsingdi, who reached Malaysian coast by a boat and got caught while entering the country, said he was given one meal a day and subjected physical torture by the camp authorities.
He had given Tk 225,000 to a manpower agent to get a job in Malaysia. The amount of money meant a lot to him. But what he wanted right at that moment was to go back home and get united with his dear and near ones.
What has been revealed by a BBC report last Saturday involving Bangladesh nationals in Thailand has dwarfed the sorry tales of the detained migrant workers in Malaysia.
Thai authorities rescued 134 Bangladesh nationals last week who were sold as slaves to work in rubber plantation deep in Thai jungle. Human traffickers in the guise of manpower agents had promised the victims well-paid jobs in Thailand and put them in ferry boats.
But during their journey from Bangladesh coast to Thailand, they were beaten, abused and drugged. After reaching the Thai jungle they were, allegedly, sold as slaves to owners of rubber plantation. Â
It was not the first case of trafficking Bangladesh nationals into Thai territory. The Bangladesh embassy in Thailand has revealed that a total of 700 Bangladeshis, who were victims of human trafficking, were rescued this year alone.
It is most likely that many more Bangladesh nationals have fallen victim to one of the worst-forms of human abuse. They have remained undetected. Allegations have it that a section of unscrupulous Thai officials and citizens have been aiding the human traffickers in exchange for bribes.
The incidents of Bangladesh nationals dying or suffering while entering foreign lands to secure employment have been rather very common.
They die in mountains, high seas, dense jungle and deserts while trying to enter foreign lands illegally using freezer vans, ferry boats and many other forms of transport.
But why should they be so desperate when stories involving the tragic deaths of so many illegal migrants are known widely, courtesy of the media? Â
This particular question should have agitated the minds of our leaders who very often claim that Bangladesh has become a 'role model' for development in the world.
No country can develop without achieving a respectable level of economic growth in a sustained manner.
Bangladesh, according to government statistics, has been achieving a 6.0 per cent plus economic growth for the past few years. Such a respectable level of growth is supposed to generate, if not sufficient but more or less satisfactory level of, employment opportunities across the country.
But the growing desperation among mostly unskilled able-bodied workers to take up jobs abroad does prompt one to ponder about actual impact of so-called development in the labour market.
Bangladeshi workers send home nearly $15 billion annually. There has not been any genuine effort to know the volume of funds remitted by illegal Bangladeshi migrant workers. It could be that the large part of the money comes from the illegal ones.
A good number of countries have been lenient towards illegal Bangladeshi migrant workers for reasons that their own workforces are reluctant to engage in jobs that the former usually do.
But the situation may not remain so in the coming days and there could be a change in the approach to illegal workers. That could prove disastrous for both Bangladesh and the illegal migrant workers.
The government should make an in-depth assessment of the country's migrant workers' situation. It cannot allow its citizens to be part of the 17th century slave trade.
The aim of all development efforts should be to generate enough productive employment opportunities for the citizens, educated or otherwise.
The rescue of the Bangladeshi 'slaves' from Thai rubber plantation does seriously hurt the image of the country. Moreover, the appeal made by our leaders repeatedly to brighten the image of the country internationally sounds ridiculous against the backdrop of the discovery of dens filled with Bangladeshi slaves.
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