BHUBANESWAR: When Jagatsinghpur native Adarsh Behera received a job offer in 2022 from a plastic manufacturing company in Sudan, he hoped to make life better for his seven-member family that struggled to make ends meet through farming. However, his ordeal began in April 2023 when civil war broke out in Sudan. Struggling without money and food, he was captured and jailed by Rapid Support Forces (RSF), a Darfur-based paramilitary group, for nearly one and a half months. On Wednesday, his nightmare ended after he reached Bhubaneswar, following his rescue a day earlier.Previously employed with a plastic company in Surat (Gujarat), Behera was offered the job of a machine operator by the owner of Sukrati Plastic factory at Al Fashir in Sudan. The Sudan factory procured raw materials from the Surat-based company, and its owner liked Behera’s work. He was promised a salary of around $1,000 per month.Hailing from Kotakana, he shifted to Sudan in Nov 2022 and worked for eight months until the company was shut down after the civil war started. “Since I signed a contract of three years, our owner asked us to stay back as he expected the war to get over in two to three months. But that didn’t happen. My salary stopped, but he provided us free food and water for a year,” recalled Behera. When the situation did not improve after a year, the free food stopped, and Behera was left to fend for himself. With prices of even basic items spiralling due to the war, he survived on just bread and biscuits. Behera’s wife, Sasmita, had to sell all her jewellery to send him Rs 2 lakh in the past one year to buy bread and medicines.
“All throughout, I hid in the accommodation provided by the owner in Al Fashir, but as bombings and gunfire increased, I felt it was no longer safe to stay there,” he said. On Oct 24, he decided to find a safer spot but was captured by RSF, who suspected that he worked for the Sudanese army.Five days later, his family received a voice message informing them that he was abducted, and subsequently, a video was sent to them showing him surrounded by armed men. “They assaulted me on day 1 and kept me in a small room at Mina jail in Al Fashir. One of those armed men was kind enough to give me a mobile phone, and I could contact my family through WhatsApp for five minutes every day,” he said.RSF told him that his release could only be secured by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) that works in the region. Subsequently, his family approached chief minister Mohan Charan Majhi, ICRC and ministry of external affairs (MEA) to intervene. The issue was also raised in Parliament by Jagatsinghpur MP Bibhu Prasad Tarai. Subsequently, the Indian embassy in Sudan and ICRC coordinated to release him from captivity on Tuesday.CM Majhi thanked the MEA and the Indian embassy for the successful mission. “The safety and well-being of every Odia, whether within the state or abroad, is the top priority of our govt. In times of crisis, we are always and forever by your side,” he wrote on X.
