KUALA LUMPUR: For eight months, 14-year-old Dil Ruckshan was held captive in a flat in Sentul, forced to do housework and beaten every time he asked to speak to his grandmother in Switzerland.
Bread was all he was given to eat, and even that was on an irregular basis.

The Sri Lankan teenager was brought to Malaysia by a travel agent who had been paid by his grandmother to take him to Switzerland to be with her and his 8-year-old sister.

MIC national Youth coordinator T. Mohan said Dil`s family had been worried about his safety, what with the war between the government and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam.

Instead of taking him to Switzerland, the agent brought Dil here.
`They arrived at the Kuala Lumpur International Airport on Aug 21 last year and Dil was taken to a flat in Sentul where a woman lived with her 8-year-old daughter and brother-in-law,` said Mohan.

Then four months of extortion began as the agent tried to get money from Dil`s grandmother, S. Pushparatnam.

Pushparatnam paid the agent 8,500 euros (RM39,300) for Dil`s `safekeeping` and was initially allowed to speak to her grandson.

However, when the agent tried to get another 1,000 euros after the fourth month, she refused to pay.

That was when all communications between her and Dil were cut.

On April 24, Pushparatnam, 52, decided that enough was enough and consulted the Sri Lankan High Commission in Malaysia, which recommended that she get in touch with MIC Youth.

She contacted MIC Youth members recruitment and voters registration bureau chief G. Kumar who took her to the Dang Wangi district police headquarters to lodge a report on April 27.

Within 24 hours, Dil was reunited with his grandmother.

Speaking to reporters yesterday, Dil claimed he was beaten and forced to work for the woman and her brother-in-law, with little or no food at times.

`They tore up my passport and told me I would never leave this country. I was afraid of not seeing my grandmother and my 8-year-old sister in Switzerland. I never thought I would be freed,` said Dil in Tamil, with Mohan interpreting.

Pushparatnam said she was grateful for MIC`s help, adding that her priority now was to get Dil a new passport.

`He must return to Sri Lanka first but this time, I will not use an agent.

`After this, I will apply for refugee status with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees for him to come to Switzerland.`

Selangor Criminal Investigations Department chief Datuk Hasnan Hassan said the woman and her brother-in-law, both in their 30s, were arrested on the evening of April 27.

He said Dil was found with the woman`s daughter at a restaurant nearby.

Hasnan said police were investigating the case as kidnapping or abduction with intent to secretly and wrongfully confine a person.

The woman and her brother-in-law have been remanded until Monday.