According to the Labour Department, the suspect was nabbed after he lodged a police report claiming that 48 of his employees – who were hired to perform high-tension cable installation work at Kampung Chamang – had absconded.
It said the police and Immigration Department would probe the suspect under the Anti-Trafficking in Persons and Anti-Smuggling of Migrants Act 2007.
It also said it would investigate the suspect for various offences under the Employment Act, including failing to pay wages for more than three months.
“The workers claimed that their employer initially promised them a monthly wage of 25,000 rupees per month.
“However, they alleged that most workers had to date received salary for their first month of employment only,” it said in a statement, adding that several of the workers also claimed their employer had impounded their travel documents/passports.
Yesterday, it was reported that a group of Indian workers from Thirunelveli in Tamil Nadu, India, had claimed they were being held against their will by the agent who brought them to Malaysia.
They said the agent had threatened to send their “dead bodies home”.
In a police report sighted by FMT, P Muniandy, who is the political secretary to minister P Waythamoorthy, urged the police to investigate the claims made by the workers in a video which has gone viral in Malaysia and India.
In the video, the workers said they were tricked by their agent who held them against their will for four months in Bentong.
According to one worker, they were not even allowed to talk to each other for more than 10 minutes, and they only managed to take the video after the agent and employer went out to buy petrol.
The 48 have been put up in a temporary shelter in the Batu Caves Hindu temple.