A six-year-old Indian girl died in the US of heat stroke after being separated from her mother who went looking for water in Arizona desert, authorities in the US said.
Six-year-old Gurpreet Kaur was found on Wednesday when the temperatures reached 42 degrees. A medical examiner said she died of hyperthermia after she was separated from her mother who went looking for water with another woman.
Gurpreet and her mother entered the US, crossing the border with Mexico on Tuesday morning after people smugglers dropped them there among a group of five migrants.
US Customs and Border Protection said the group was dropped off near the border "by human smugglers who ordered the group to cross in the dangerous and austere location."
After walking some distance, Gurpreet’s mother went with another woman to look for water, leaving the girl with another woman and her child. But the women lost their way and wandered for 22 hours before they were located by the US Border Patrol. Four hours later, Gurpreet’s body was found 1.5 kilometers from the border.
“This is a senseless death driven by cartels who are profiting from putting lives at risk."
Satnam Singh Chahal of North American Punjabi Association says “countless” number of Indians, mainly Punjabis, try to enter the US illegally and land in trouble.
“There is big number of Indian migrants currently in detention. Some succeed in getting into the US undetected, but those who are caught spend months and years in detention, depending upon the state they are caught in,” he said.
“Some states release migrants from detention very soon, even giving them driver license so that they can work, while in some other states, like Texas, they locked up for very long times.”
Mr Chahal says people smugglers exploit the desperation of people to get to the US and don’t tell them about the hardships that await the migrants.
“Arizona is relatively soft on migrants, so is California. But once they get there, they have to find their way through desert and wilderness and that proves fatal for some,” he told SBS Punjabi.
Chief Patrol Agent Roy Villareal held the people smugglers responsible for Gurpreet’s death.
“This is a senseless death driven by cartels who are profiting from putting lives at risk."
Arizona recorded 127 heat-related deaths of migrants. Until May 30, the number is at 58 this year.
Quoting the US Border Patrol figures, the CNN reports that nearly 9,000 people from India were apprehended at the Southwest border in 2018 - more than triple the number in 2017 when 2,943 Indian migrants were apprehended.
