Following President Donald Trump's order cracking down on illegal immigration into the country, the US's borders with Canada and Mexico have been fortified to keep undocumented migrants out. This is bad news for hundreds, if not thousands, of migrants from Latin America and countries including India, who had been on the move for months, hoping to make their way to the US.
They travel through different countries in Latin America, through rugged terrains, forests, and rivers, to reach the US border with Mexico.
Among the non-Latin American countries, India is home to the highest number of illegal immigrants who take such routes to enter the US. In India, people from states like Gujarat, Punjab, and Haryana make up the majority of these illegal immigrants, and many are still on the migrant trail.
According to a report, some two dozen men from Jhulasan village in Gujarat's Gandhinagar, who had set out on the dunki route recently, are now missing. Jhulasan village is also the ancestral home of NASA's Indian-origin astronaut Sunita Williams.
The village, dominated by the Patidar community, has around 2,000 of its residents in the US, many of whom entered the country illegally.
According to a Times of India report, families of the two dozen men have not been able to contact them, and their whereabouts are unknown.
"The horror stories some of these deportees have returned with are adding to our anxiety over the whereabouts of the two dozen men who remain untraceable," a villager told The Times of India.
Some in the village still believe that the missing men are safe and that they could be lying low on the advice of the immigration agents to avoid getting caught.
In Jhulasan, like many other villages in Gujarat, having a family member settle in the US is a matter of prestige, and people are willing to take any risk to achieve it, legally or illegally.
For more news and current affairs?from around the world, please visit Indiatimes News.