India’s National Investigation Agency arrested a long-absconding suspect in a 2021 Sri Lanka human-trafficking case on Friday, taking him into custody at Bengaluru International Airport immediately after Sri Lankan authorities repatriated him.
The suspect, named as Pudumadam Imran, had been detained in Sri Lanka on the basis of an INTERPOL Red Notice issued at the NIA’s request, the Daily Mirror reported, carrying a report by the Indian wire service IANS.
The allegations
According to the agency, the accused took an active part in a conspiracy to traffic victims out of Sri Lanka by falsely promising to take them to Canada on valid documents. He is alleged to have collected money from victims’ families and relatives and moved the funds through hawala channels to co-accused in India, who then trafficked and confined the victims.
The case began with raids by local police on premises in Mangaluru, Karnataka, after information that Sri Lankan nationals were living there without valid documents. Charges were initially filed under provisions of the Indian Penal Code, the Foreigners’ Act and the Passport Act.
The NIA then took over the investigation and re-registered the case on 13 July 2021, under IPC Sections 120B (criminal conspiracy), 370 (trafficking of persons) and 420 (cheating), Section 14 of the Foreigners’ Act and Section 12(1A) of the Passport Act.
The agency said Imran had remained absconding until his detention and repatriation by Sri Lankan authorities.
The wider case
The arrest is the latest step in an investigation that has run for more than five years and has already produced charges against several people. Sri Lankan newsrooms reported in January 2024 that the NIA had filed a supplementary chargesheet against four accused over the trafficking of 39 Sri Lankan nationals into India on the false pretext of onward travel to Canada — naming Pudumadam Imran among the absconders at that time. In August 2024, NewsFirst reported the arrest of a principal accused in the same case. Those earlier reports are cited here as background; they are more than two years old and are not relied on for any current fact.
The direction of travel in this case is unusual. Sri Lanka more often receives suspects repatriated from abroad on Red Notices than sends them — this desk has reported several such returns through Bandaranaike International Airport this year, including 112 suspects sought across 13 countries and a Red Notice arrest at Wadduwa. Here Sri Lanka was the detaining and repatriating state.
Sri Lanka remains on Tier 2 of the US State Department’s Trafficking in Persons report, for a fifth consecutive year.
Not reported
The filing does not say when Imran was detained in Sri Lanka, how long he had been in the country, where in Sri Lanka he was held, or which Sri Lankan agency carried out the detention and handover. It gives no number of victims in the current proceedings, does not say how many accused remain at large, and records no comment from Sri Lankan authorities. Nor does it say whether Imran holds Indian or Sri Lankan nationality — “Pudumadam” is a coastal town in Tamil Nadu’s Ramanathapuram district, and the report does not clarify whether the name reflects origin there.
Sourcing
A single-source report among verified newsrooms. The Daily Mirror filing is syndicated Indian wire copy credited to IANS rather than original reporting, and carries no staff byline. A search found the same wire report reproduced across numerous Indian outlets, none of them within this desk’s verified set; the verified Indian newsrooms this desk relies on were not reachable for this check. Additional details circulating in the wire copy — including an accused number for Imran and dates for two earlier arrests in the case — could not be confirmed from a verified source and are not reproduced here.
