US: NJ Hindu Temple Faces Forced Labor Accusations

Controversy surrounded the BAPS temple of Robbinsville of New Jersey for allegedly using forced labor from India. Federal law enforcement agents accused a prominent Hindu sect of luring workers from India and paying them the equivalent of about $1.20 an hour for their labor.

A lawsuit has been filed on Tuesday that Bochasanwasi Akshar Purushottam Swaminarayan Sanstha, accusing the same of exploiting possibly hundreds of low-caste men in the yearslong construction project that started in 2014 and is still going on.

The workers are said to be promised jobs helping the temple construction in rural Robbinsville New Jersey with standard work hours, the wage claim filed in US District court said. The majority of the workers are said to be Dalits.

The workers were brought to the United States on religious visas, or R1 visas that are raised for clergy and lay religious workers, but presented to the US government as volunteers. They were asked to tell the US embassy that they are skilled carvers and decorative painters and were made to sign several documents.

The workers are said to be made to perform manual labor on the site for more than 13 hours a day lifting the large stone, digging ditches and shoveling snow, etc for just $450 per month. They were paid $50 in cash while the rest is deposited in Indian bank accounts according to the complaint.

The Chief executive of BAPS Kanu Patel denied the allegations of a wage claim. A spokesperson of BAPS, Lenin Joshi condemned the accusations saying the men did complicated work connecting stones that were hand-carved in India and they were needed here as only special artisans can join the jigsaw puzzle-like structure construction.

Three federal agencies FBI, DHS, and the Department of Labor were involved in the action against BAPS temple labor and immigration law violations. The allegations further say that more than 90 workers were removed from the site. The workers’ passports had been confiscated, while they were confined to the fenced and guarded site, and also were banned from talking to visitors and religious volunteers.

Last month, the New Jersey State Department of Labor and Workforce Development ordered a construction company to stop working on the Robbinsville and also that at Edison NJ after finding the firm was paying laborers off the book and did no have workers’ compensation insurance.