Stay out of India

India's a dangerous place to visit. Yes, backpackers love it, High-tech can't live with it, and yet, it's not the place I want to hang out. (Almost as bad as Manila)

Seems that Israeli drug dealers in India plant drugs on innocent backpacker Israelies, and then report them, so they stay in good grace with the local police authorities. The backpackers then end up in jail, and the current estimates are that 25% of Israelies in Indian prisons for drug-related charges, were framed.

YNET sums it up like this:

Speaking under the false name of Haim, he said his son has been in a Bombai jail for one-and-a-half years. Soon after the arrest Haim and his wife left Israel and settled in a house near the prison where their 24-year-old son is imprisoned.

"They turned it into a Hollywood film. A horror story the end of which can't be seen on the horizon. They fixed my son the same way Messing warned about. My son is accused of trying to smuggle grass outside India and we are undergoing a legal process."

He said: "Any lawyer who sees the case will laugh at the fact that my son is still in jail. A normal judge in a normal court would have stopped the case. If the court rules that my son is guilty he will get ten years and it will take two years to appeal the court ruling."

The parents meet their son once a week in court. They avoid going to jail because of the difficult scenes they have to see.

"Dogs in Israel live like kings in comparison to how my son is living there. Visits are traumatic for us. My wife and I are trying to be strong but it is hell here. India is paradise and hell at the same time … We behave like robots and I am not returning to Israel until my son returns with me," he said.

Wherever I am, my blog turns towards Eretz Yisrael