'He Took Rs 7 Lakh From Me,' Says Keralite Trafficked to Russia as CBI Arrests 4

Prince Sebastin, trafficked to fight in Ukraine, returned to India on medical grounds and cooperated with the CBI.

Prince Sebastian, a 24-year-old Keralite fisherman.

(Photo: Kamran Akhter/The Quint)

Prince Sebastian, a 24-year-old Keralite fisherman, who fought in the Russia-Ukraine war in March and returned with severe injuries, heaved a sigh of relief upon learning that Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) agents had arrested four Indian traffickers. The traffickers had duped him and his cousins, Vineeth Silva and Tinu Pani Adima, in January with false promises and sent him to Russia.

"I feel relieved to learn that the CBI has arrested four traffickers who are deceiving unemployed youths like us," he told The Quint in an exclusive interview.

"Among the four arrested, Yesudas Junior, also known as Priyan, was the person who deceived me. He took Rs 7,00,000 from me for migration and promised me a security job in Russia. However, upon my arrival in Russia, I was placed in an army camp, trained in weapon handling, and sent to the battlefield in Lushank, Ukraine," Prince added.

Despite Prince and his cousins reaching Russia together, they were separated by the traffickers who had sold them to the Russian Army. All were put in different camps.

A Glimpse of Prince's Horrifying Experience in the War

According to a note from CBI on Tuesday, traffickers have been operating as an organised network and were luring Indian nationals through social media channels like YouTube and also through their local contacts/agents for highly paid jobs in Russia.

“Thereafter, the trafficked Indian Nationals were trained in combat roles and deployed at front bases in the Russia - Ukraine War Zone against their wishes, thus, putting their lives in grave danger. It has been ascertained that some of the victims also got grievously injured in the war zone,” the CBI note added.

According to Prince, him, along with cousins, and a few other Indians were duped, trafficked, and forced to fight the Russian-Ukraine war, exactly what the CBI has stated.

In Prince’s case, on 4 February, around 6 pm, during his first day on the battlefield, he and his fellow soldiers were advancing in Lushank in Ukraine when they came under heavy fire from Ukrainian forces. Prince was moving alongside a tank. As he reached for his AK-47 to return fire, his gun strap became tangled. A bullet from a Ukrainian soldier struck the Russian tank with a sickening thud, the impact piercing Prince's left ear and filling his mouth with blood. He stumbled and fell onto the body of a fallen Russian soldier.

In the chaos, Prince spotted a drone hovering menacingly above him and another Russian soldier. A terrifying hiss sent chills down his spine. Reacting instinctively, Prince lunged for cover just as the drone unleashed a grenade. It detonated with a deafening roar near the Russian soldier beside him, killing him instantly. A shower of flesh and bone rained down on Prince like confetti. The grenade shells pierced the left side of his body making him bleed more.

Dazed and bloodied, Prince scrambled back over fallen soldiers, desperately seeking refuge. He reached the trench and was pulled in by his cousin, Vineeth. Prince was seeing Vineeth after several days, as they were separated shortly after landing in Russia and were placed in different army training camps.

Vineeth and Prince spent that night huddled in the trench. Desperate to escape the battlefield, they crawled for an estimated four kilometres through the trench system until they reached a Russian base. By this point, Prince had lost consciousness.

Vineeth, taking charge in the absence of his incapacitated cousin, briefed the commanders about their situation. Prince was then rushed to a nearby hospital for urgent medical attention.

'How Can I Sit Idle When My Cousins Are Still on the War Front?'

Prince's ordeal didn't end there. He was transferred between five hospitals, the bullet was removed from his head, before finally reaching Moscow. With the help of social workers, he managed to contact his family back in Kerala. Thanks to their tireless efforts and appeals on humanitarian grounds, Prince was repatriated in the first week of April.

Even though Prince came back he was worried over his cousins, Vineeth and Tinu, who were still stuck in Russia.

"How can I sit idle when my cousins are still on the war front? So, I cooperated with the CBI to hunt down the traffickers. Even though I was shattered and suffered trauma, I went to police stations and CBI offices whenever they summoned me. Finally, our efforts have yielded results. At least four traffickers are arrested. That itself is a great deal," Prince told The Quint.

When the news broke that Indians were trafficked to Russia and fighting the Russian-Ukraine war, the CBI initiated a probe on 6 March.

The CBI had raided 13 locations in Delhi, Trivandrum, Mumbai, Ambala, Chandigarh, Madurai and Chennai, seized Rs 50 lakhs, incriminating documents and electronic records like laptops, mobiles, desktops, CCTV footage etc.

In a note of 7 March, the CBI had said that, so far around 35 instances of victims sent abroad have been established. Finally, on Tuesday, the CBI arrested Arun Norbert and Yesudas Junior, also known as Priyan, both residents of Trivandrum, Kerala, Nijil Jobi Bensam from Kanyakumari, and Anthony Michael Elangovan from Mumbai. They were arrested and sent to judicial custody.

According to the CBI, Nijil was working in Russia on a contract basis as a translator and was one of the key members of the network operating in Russia for facilitating the recruitment of Indian nationals in the Russian Army.

“Anthony was facilitating with a Faisal Baba based in Dubai and others based in Russia in getting the visa processing done in Chennai and booking the air tickets for victims to go to Russia. Accused Arun and Yesudas were the main recruiters of Indian nationals belonging to Kerala and Tamil Nadu for the Russian Army,” the CBI note states, adding that investigation is continuing against other accused persons who are part of this international network of human traffickers.

Social worker Ignatious Loyala, based in Thiruvananthapuram on the South Kerala coast, says climate change is causing harsh conditions in the fishing industry, pushing young people into poverty and unemployment, making them vulnerable to traffickers.

“As climate change disrupts fishing off the Thiruvananthapuram coast, families like Prince's are drowning in poverty. Desperate for work, young men become easy targets for devious recruiters, often losing their savings and risking their lives in nightmarish situations,” Ignatious told The Quint.

Unfortunately, Kerala has the highest unemployment rate for young adults in the country: more than 28 percent, compared with a national average of 10 percent for people in the 15-29 age group.

Prince told The Quint that he even heard Hindi spoken in the army camps, leading him to suspect that young people from across India, not just the South, are being deceived, trafficked, and forced to fight for Putin in Ukraine. On 10 March, The Quint first reported about Indians from Punjab and Haryana forced to work as soldiers for Russia.

Meanwhile, Mini Mohan, a migration specialist, told The Quint that unemployment among educated youngsters is forcing them to migrate to even war-torn countries in search of jobs, risking their lives.

The India Employment Report 2024 released by the International Labour Organisation (ILO) and the Institute of Human Development (IHD), reported that India’s youth between the ages of 15 and 34 account for almost 83 percent of the country’s unemployed workforce.