Another 24 Bangladeshis are likely to have met their watery grave off the coast of foreign land thousands of miles away from home. There were 78 lucky survivors who were in the same boat trying, apparently, to reach Libya. Interestingly, the illegal migrants apprehended so far by the law enforcing agencies or who drowned in the high seas are not merely individuals seeking greener pastures elsewhere. In many cases, an entire family consisting of the wife and children were part of the immigrant groups seeking fortunes outside the country. And this is what begs the question.

It is not as if people have not been chancing their luck, in some cases successfully, to seek employment outside the country dodging the legal route. But hardly had we come across stories of Bangladeshis being made commodities of slave trade. People have been caught in the past crossing the border into neighbouring countries but the phenomenon we are witnessing now is perhaps unprecedented. Hundreds of these unfortunate people have been killed by the traffickers in the name of providing employment abroad. And in this odious business both Bangladeshis and foreign racketeers have joined hands. 

The question is why that is so. Is it because prospects of overseas employment through legal and official channels have reduced to the extent that people are being compelled to resort to the method that they have? Or are they victims of machinations by unscrupulous people exploiting the needy and the gullible? Whatever be the reason, the government must get to the heart of the matter to spare more Bangladeshis the fate that so many of their countrymen have met in trying to reach foreign shores illegally.