Special investigation: Exposing the human trafficking industry selling Nepalese women into domestic slavery in Kuwait

On April 16, 2018, two women were stopped while attempting to cross into India at the Gaddachauki border point in western Nepal's Kanchanpur district.

The border police and a team from Maiti Nepal, an anti-human trafficking organisation, who often collaborate, found the women's behaviour "suspicious" during questioning about their travel plans.

"We're going to Delhi for a New Year tour," they had said - both women with the same explanation. However, they didn't have enough cash to last them any length of time, nor did they seem to be in the holiday mood.

Sub-inspector Dikardev Pant, in charge of the Area Police Office at Gaddachauki, also found their body language "curious". They often exchanged glances and when asked questions, their replies lacked coherence.

Both women were from Sindhupalchok, a remote mountainous district of Nepal - Kaushila Tamang, a 35-year-old was from Thangpaldhap, and Ramila Tamang, 32, from Bhotenamlang.

The police interrogated them further. The truth eventually emerged. They were heading for Kuwait, not India; New Delhi was their transit point for a flight to a life in the Gulf.

They were being escorted by family members to the Indian capital - Kaushila by her husband and Ramila by her brother-in-law.

Speaking with The New Arab, they admitted that they had planned to travel to Kuwait clandestinely.

Read the first part of the investigation here: How young Nepalese girls, desperate for work, are being trafficked to the Gulf

As Nepal's government bans Nepalese women from going to Kuwait to work as domestic servants, they thought they had found a reliable - if illegal - way to get there: to be trafficked into Kuwait from New Delhi.

Kaushila told us she had been driven to seek work in Kuwait because of a lack of money to look after her children:  

"Would I take this trouble if I earned enough money in my own country to live on? Why would I choose to go to Kuwait with the help of agents if I had better opportunities here?"

As Nepal's government bans Nepalese women from going to Kuwait to work as domestic servants, they thought they had found a reliable - if illegal - way to get there: to be trafficked into Kuwait from New Delhi

However, they were all arrested as they were crossing the border. While in police custody, one of the men, Ramila Tamang's brother-in-law, confessed he had planned to accompany her to Delhi for her flight to Kuwait.

According to the Nepal border police, human traffickers are posing as legitimate employment brokers, before selling Nepalese women to countries in the Gulf via India. The women are prevented from entering India if they are stopped by the police and organisations working against human trafficking. But there are no records of those who evade arrest before crossing the border.

Many cross, in full knowledge of the illegality of working in Kuwait, but believing their "employment agents" are trying to help them escape from poverty back home.

	India-Nepal Border: Nepal immigration check-point at Gaddachauki, Kanchanpur [Pramod Acharya]

According to the Nepal Ministry of Labour and Foreign Employment, in the years 2015/16 and 2016/17, the Department of Foreign Employment (DOFE) issued 786,564 permits to Nepalese citizens for foreign employment to more than one hundred destination countries.

The report, Labour Migration for Employment - A Status Report for Nepal: 2015/2016-2016/2017, shows large-scale labour migration from Nepal with most emigrants going to the countries which are members of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), and Malaysia. It states that between 2008/09 and 2014/15, 85 percent of all labour migration was to GCC countries and Malaysia.  

Yhe report goes on to explain: "In the past nine fiscal years… 355,4683 permits were issued... 29.88 percent were for Malaysia, followed by Qatar (21.57 percent), Saudi Arabia (20.37), UAE (10.62 percent), Kuwait (2.54), Republic of Korea (1.32 percent), Bahrain (0.86 percent) and Oman (0.63 percent)."  

These figures document those who left the country from Nepal's international airport. But there is no documentation about those who secretly crossed the India-Nepal border and eventually reached the Gulf by other means.

	Report continues below:

Compelled to leave

Some women are prepared to take risks even when they know they are being trafficked. Family members and neighbours also cooperate and even help the traffickers.

When detained by police, these women are reluctant to reveal details such as their planned destination, why they want to leave, who is helping them and what arrangements have been made with trafficking agents. 

"Victims themselves don't want to speak the truth," said Dilliraj Bista, superintendent of police in Kanchanpur. "We screen cases but the investigation gets complicated when they hesitate to speak."

However, Ramila Tamang admitted to us that her brother-in-law was involved, and suggested family involvement was not unusual.  

"I was ready to go when my brother-in-law promised to send me abroad," she said.

Other women risking their lives to go to the Gulf illegally say they have no choice

Other women risking their lives to go to the Gulf illegally say they have no choice.

The story of Elisha Tamang, a 22-year-old from Orang village in Dolakha district, is harrowing. She was taken to Oman about a year ago. The agents kept her in Oman for a few weeks before sending her on to Kuwait where they could get a better price for her. There she was sold.

In a statement given to the Metropolitan Police Crime Division in Kathmandu, she said she was prepared to work for an employer in the Gulf because of her poverty in Nepal.

She lived in a rural village and was jobless. She had left school after the ninth grade as her family didn't have the means for her to continue her education. When her family became destitute, she left home and went to the capital, Kathmandu, and found work in a clothing shop. She was paid very little, and she and her husband decided he would go abroad to work.

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However, when he failed the medical test, she decided that she would go instead. Due to her lack of skills, she was unsuccessful with employment agencies and decided to go abroad illegally - by crossing the border and being sold.

In her statement to the police, Elisha Tamang said: "I didn't have a single rupee to feed my baby, and my husband was sick. In this situation, there was no option left for me but to go abroad."

Tamang's husband had taken her to New Delhi via the Bhairahawa border and left her with human traffickers posing as foreign employment agents.

During seven months in Kuwait she worked for three Kuwaiti families as a housemaid. Members of all three families exploited her physically and mentally, she said.

In the first house, she worked for up to 20 hours daily and the owner of the house frequently sexually harrassed her.

"The owner forcefully exploited me physically every day. He used to beat me. He often appeared aggressive and I was aware of his intention to molest me," she said.

As she refused to have sex with the owner, he returned her to the agents from which he had bought her. They then sold her to another family, where Elisha faced similar issues. She was again returned and sent to a third home. She said the third home owner was a Kuwaiti police officer.  

The owner forcefully exploited me physically every day. He used to beat me. He often appeared aggressive and I was aware of his intention to molest me

"I knew that women were being sold in the Gulf countries. I also knew that I was going to the Gulf illegally, but I was not sure to which country. As I knew that I was going to the Gulf illegally, I crossed the India-Nepal border secretly. Then I reached Oman via India. After a few weeks, I reached Kuwait.

"After I started being exploited in Kuwait, one day I called my husband and told him of my real situation. At that time I wanted to return home. But my passport had been confiscated by the house owner. Then I heard that my husband had called Rescue Nepal, an anti-human trafficking NGO. People from Rescue Nepal coordinated with the Nepal police. The police coordinated with the Nepal embassy in Kuwait and also with Interpol Kuwait. Then I was rescued."

The agents working for Elisha Tamang's traffickers were arrested after the police issued a Red Notice - an international arrest warrant issued by Interpol.

Mina Lama and Shyam Kumar Lama, the couple who sold Elisha Tamang in Kuwait, were extradited and arrived in Nepal on 20 May 2018, and 24 May 2018 respectively. We'll reveal more about them later in this investigation.

According to Nepal's Metropolitan Police Crime Division, women are being sold into the Gulf countries particularly from areas heavily damaged by the 2015 earthquake. Sindhupalchok was one of the districts worst hit by the April 2015 quake which killed almost 9,000 people and injured about 22,000.

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In Sindhupalchok district alone, 3,573 people died and 86,971 homes were completely destroyed. To date, only about half the houses have been rebuilt.

Aashman Tamang, the chief district officer of Sindhupalchok, says the the delayed reconstruction is down to the slow pace of work of the National Reconstruction Authority (NRA).

"We are doing our job efficiently, but the main party responsible for reconstruction is not serious in their task. They only focus on physical reconstruction. Without considering the social and financial condition of people during the reconstruction phase, we cannot stop human trafficking."

Women from this district are being trafficked more than anywhere else in Nepal.

"People here have remained poor for long. They are illiterate too," said Sindhupalchok Khyali Singh, the deputy inspector of the district's police.  

"Left in a limbo after their houses were destroyed, women from here are going to the Gulf countries to earn some money."

The women of other affected districts such as Dhading and Nuwakot have also become victims of trafficking, particularly poor and illiterate women from the more remote areas rife with poverty and unemployment.

Analysing the socioeconomic causes of human trafficking, Sunita Danuwar, the executive director of Shakti Samuha Nepal - an organisation formed by the female survivors of trafficking in India - takes the same view as Deputy Inspector Singh: women are being sold by the so-called agents of foreign employment agencies because they lack money, are illiterate, and unaware of what lies in store for them.

Danuwar herself is a trafficking victim and was rescued from India years ago.

"Exploiting their [the women's] weaknesses, human traffickers are running their racket without hindrance," she said.

Ramila's situation is a case in point: she was prepared to take an illegal route to find work and money to support her two children. Her husband was also prepared to see his wife leave this way.  

"I wanted to go in the hope of earning some money," said Ramila. "My husband also said I could leave."

Family members are taken into confidence and cooperate; they hope the income made abroad will ensure a good future for the whole family back home. People deprived of basic services such as food, health and education are vulnerable and thus will take huge risks to venture overseas in the hope of better earnings.

This, too, was the the reason that Kaushila's husband agreed that agents could take her to Kuwait. 

"Had he been able to earn money at home, to educate our children, my husband would not have taken me on a journey to Kuwait," she said, her voice unsteady. The couple have three daughters under ten years old, but can barely feed them, let alone send them to school.

Kaushila also said that her father and mother were in poor health and at any time she might have to find money for their treatment - going abroad to work would be a help, she thought.

"I don't know whether you believe me or not, but going to the Gulf via an illegal path was not my wish, I was forced to do it by my situation."

I don't know whether you believe me or not, but going to the Gulf via an illegal path was not my wish, I was forced to do it by my situation

An open border

Nepal and India share a 1,690 kilometre border with just 22 official crossing points. When crossing the border by land, no documents at all are required. It is a situation ripe for traffickers to exploit.

It's therefore difficult for the police to send women who they believe are being trafficked back to Nepal if they don't have evidence.

Kanchanpur, a border district of Nepal, is only 337 kilometres from India's capital and so has become a major supply point of women for trafficking, according to Dilliraj Bista, the district superintendent of police.

Human traffickers and their agents come up with numerous ways to deceive the police while taking women from remote parts of the country across the border.

Often they instruct the women to say they are on a tour or going to a job.

"It's hard to say if the women are indeed headed for [legitimate] employment in India," said Bista. 

Afterall, it is common for Nepalese people to travel to India for a visit or for employment. But it's difficult to say how many are working or travelling in India at any given time because there is no official documentation.

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There are, however, some estimates. In 2009, the World Bank estimated there were 867,000 Nepalis working in India. According to the 2001 census, approximately 600,000 were working in India.

Indian police officials blame the border force of the Nepal Police for the unchecked trafficking of women.

"This can be stopped if Nepal's police properly scrutinise cases," said an official working at one of the anti-human trafficking units of the Indian Police, speaking on condition of anonymity. "But the police and non-government organisations there don't take it seriously."

There are some cases when Indian police arrest the traffickers and rescue the Nepalese girls. Police of both countries say they sometimes collaborate - but also agree that the scale of collaboration is not sufficient.

Racketeers have other ways of trafficking women into India. Some say they are taking women across the border to go shopping. Having crossed the border on foot, they take a bus to New Delhi. Some take tangas and rickshaws for the border crossing, saying they are sightseeing.

"Since we [started] screening bus travellers, they seem to be employing other techniques," said Bista. "There are also those who cross on bicycles and via suspension bridges."

In fact, there are a huge variety of ways traffickers can take women and children across the border. Just over a year ago, a 16-year-old from Sindhupalchok was rescued by Maiti Nepal at the border as she was on her way to India dressed as a Buddhist nun.

The traffickers told her to say that she was going to Dharmashala in India to study at a Buddhist school. Maheshwari Bhatta, the Kanchanpur programme coordinator for Maiti Nepal, said the girl appeared to be innocent and did not know where she was being taken. 

Traffickers know their victims can get away with saying they are off to India for work or to meet relatives since many Nepalese women work in India.  

The agents advise women to say as little as possible to the police - and understandably the women take this advice. Some who hope to go to the Gulf pretend to be sick in order to enter India for medical treatment.

"The broker had taught me to say that I needed treatment for my illness," said Elisha, the 22-year-old from Orang-7 in Dolakha. "I got across with this reply."

Since the authorities do not require a passport for passage into India, traffickers keep the women's passports and return them in New Delhi after completing the visa process. In Delhi, they decide to which country the women will be sent, how and when.

Kaushila and Ramila told border police, after they admitted their intentions that they didn't know where their passports were. "We've already given it to them [the traffickers]," they said.

'Front' businesses

Traffickers hold women in New Delhi before sending them to the Gulf. 

"Women seem to be kept in Pahargunj, a town of New Delhi, for a few days before being sent to the Gulf after arranging for the visa," said Mina Pande, in charge of the Champawat-based anti-trafficking unit of the Indian police.

Police investigations shows that human traffickers fix the price of women by sending photographs to potential buyers in the Gulf

She added that women were supplied mainly from the beauty parlours and massage centres run by Nepalese expats in Delhi. Human traffickers and their agents run these beauty parlours in India as fronts to give the impression they are entrepreneurs rather than traffickers.

When the police raid them, the traffickers say they are just running a legitimate business.

Nepalese citizens can also board a flight to India from Nepal's international airport in Kathmandu without a passport, although they do need identification.  

Photographs determine a women's price

Police investigations show that human traffickers fix the price of women by sending photographs to potential buyers in the Gulf.

Traffickers in Nepal instruct women to send pictures of themselves directly to agents in the Gulf. Those looking for domestic servants there will then make a selection and pay accordingly.

The statements of traffickers themselves indicate they show the girls' photographs to possible clients and offer them in exchange for money.

Shyam Kumar Lama, who sold Elisha in Kuwait, admitted that the most important criteria in determining a price are a woman's figure, beauty and age: "The more beautiful they are, the more we may get."

Some of the accused: 1. Sagar Shrish (Baglung) 2. Tika Prasad Timsina (Jhapa) 3. Gyaljen Sherpa (Sindhupalchok) 4. Apsara Acharya (Kailali) 5. Sukamaya Tamang (Sindhupalchok) 6. Yo Chhiring Nekor Lama (Rasuwa) 7. Lawang Tamang (Sindhupalchok) 8. Krishna Bahadur Gurung (Syangja) 9. Khadga Bahadur Bishwakarma (Jhapa), 10. Dillishwar Limbu (Tehrathum), 11. Mina Lama (Sindhupalchok), 12. Jhayandra Kumar Adhikari (Morang) [Metropolitan Police Crime Division, Nepal]

The "local agent", Lawang Tamang (also known as Bijay), who sent Elisha's photo to Shyam Kumar Lama, is a resident of Duwachaur-8 in Sindhupalchok. He told police that he received up to NRS 100,000 ($880) for each women he set up.

"I get up to NRS 150,000 ($1,300) if I send a girl who is 18 to 20 years old with a good physique," he said in a statement to the police obtained by this investigation.

According to Manohar Bhatta, deputy superintendent of the Metropolitan Police Crime Division, Lawang Tamang confessed to sending more than 25 women to countries including Kuwait, Iraq, Oman and the UAE.

Shyam Kumar Lama and Mina Lama, husband and wife, are permanent residents of Thulopakhar in Sindhupalchok - but based themselves in Kuwait in order to traffic women.

"Agents send us photos from Nepal," they confessed to police following their extradition. "We show them to our clients to determine the price of a woman."

Now in jailed for the crime, the couple said they had sold Elisha for 3,200 Kuwaiti Dinars ($10,570).

Bishnu Lopchan, another trafficker, told police that he would send the Nepalese women' photographs to his clients in Gulf so they could choose from a pool of women heading to the region and ensure good money for the traffickers.

Following this selection process, Lopchan and two other traffickers took six teenage girls from Sindhupalchok to Kuwait in October 2017. Eventually, the girls were rescued and the traffickers were detained by Indian police in Rudrapur, a city in Uttarakhand, India.

Bishnu Lopchan also told police that women were taken to the Gulf on short-term visit visas.  

A statement issued by the Indian police quoting three individuals involved in the trafficking, including Lopchan, said: "We send passports to foreign agents, they provide visas through mobile [phones]".

Since visas to Kuwait can be obtained online from India, New Delhi has been the first choice of traffickers. The Kuwaiti embassy in New Delhi would not respond to our questions.  

Previously human traffickers and their agents would make frequent visits to the girls and women of interest and then take them to India themselves when the women were prepared to go abroad. The police say the traffickers now meet the women only a couple of times, mainly to secure their passports.

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"We've found girls to have been entrapped through contact on media such as phone, message, Facebook, Imo and Viber," said Rajkumar Silwal, the deputy superintendent of Nepal's Police Central Investigation Bureau.

More than a third of the Nepalese population has access to smartphones, according to the Nepal Telecommunications Authority - of 28.98 million people, there are 10 million smartphone users.

A nightmare

Most of the women who reach the Gulf this way end up as domestic servants and are subjected to terrible exploitation.

Nirmala Joshi from Jhapa, was just 14 years old when she worked in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, returning to Nepal a year ago.

"They did not pay me the promised salary. Physical assaults and torture were usual ordeals," she says. 

Before leaving home, the traffickers' agents told her she would get around 180 KD ($594) per month; she says she was not given even half of that.

Nirmala spoke of her nightmare: "In Kuwait, my employer took away my passport. Without a passport and wandering around the city, the police approached me. I was jailed and later deported."

In Kuwait, my employer took away my passport. Without a passport and wandering around the city, the police approached me. I was jailed and later deported

In the past, human traffickers faced a major risk of getting caught with the women on the Nepal-India border. They have now stopped escorting the women in person to Delhi to sell them. Trafficking ring leaders sit in the Indian capital and make arrangements for the transit of women from Nepal.

"Traffickers have got cleverer," said Maheshwari Bhatta, the Kanchanpur programme coordinator for Maiti Nepal. "They don't operate in the open. They get family members or relatives of women to take the women to Delhi."

They also tell the girls to get citizenship documents and passports with false information about their age if necessary. 

One girl from Sindhupalchok told us: "I'm only fourteen but I got my citizenship and passport as a 19-year-old so I could go abroad." She said her neighbours had advised her parents to do this.

Cases are not filed

According to Nepalese police, between July 2017 and May 2018, a total of 233 cases of human trafficking were filed across Nepal. The number of cases in the five preceding years was 227, 212, 181, 186 and 144 respectively. But the police say that the state of human trafficking is much worse than indicated by these figures.

In their view, the real figures are rising every year. The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) supports this claim. According to the NHRC, there were as many as 23,200 people trafficked in 2015/16.

Of these, 6,100 were sold, 13,600 escaped and 3,900 are presumed to be out of contact. Around 98 percent of those targeted are women. Quite clearly, the number of registered cases is very low. And there is no specific data available about those trafficked to the Gulf.

"It is difficult to estimate the undocumented migrant workers," reads a report from the National Human Rights Association. "Identification of such migrant workers especially important as many of women migrant workers are reported to have destined to Gulf region via India, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka.

"More than 200,000 females are said to be in the Gulf region for domestic work. Globally, this region accounts for the highest proportion of domestic workers (62 percent) and in case of women [domestic workers], it is 82 percent (ILO, 2015). This suggests that female migration to the Gulf region is tantamount to female migration for domestic work."

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According to the Nepalese embassy in Kuwait, in 2017, 544 domestic servants returned to Nepal as a result of having a range of difficulties. An official at the embassy, Gyanendra Sharma, said by email that common problems of domestic workers in Kuwait continue to be beatings, non-payment of salary and late payment of salary, long working hours, poor accommodation, and a lack of facilities to communicate with family back home.  

In the first five months of 2018, another 200 domestic workers returned to Nepal as a result of such issues.

SSP Chhetri, information officer of Nepal's police, said: "Not all the victims file cases. If everyone did, the scary picture of trafficking would come out."

He says victims hesitate because often the accused have family links with the victims.

"Victims are not ready to register charges against the people known to them," said Chhetri. "Even those who try to file complaints are deterred with promises from the traffickers." Sometimes the victims are offered financial favours on the condition they keep quiet. 

There are other reasons why so few victims inform the authorities. "Since the victims had consented to leave, they don't register charges against the perpetrators," said Chhetri. Moreover, most women exploited by the traffickers are uneducated and are unaware of their legal rights.

"Trafficked women lack awareness. They are not familiar with the court procedure," Chhetri said, adding that justice is even more remote for women who remain abroad.

Most women exploited by the traffickers are uneducated and are unaware of their legal rights

Sometimes, suspects are released after being arrested in the absence of evidence. And since traffickers are involved in complex networks and cross-border deals, detaining them poses additional challenges. These legal challenges have emboldened the criminals.

The police, by their own admission, also hesitate to get involved.

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"Victims don't open up to us. When they don't want to reveal facts, we don't press them either," one police officer said on condition of anonymity. "The racket is big. Why should we alone take risks when victims don't want [to help]?"

According to Nepal's Human Trafficking and Transportation (Control) Act 2007, legal action can only begin when the statement of the victim is certified by the district court. Sometimes victims give different statements to the police and later to the court. As a result, the police's work has been limited to detaining women and men accompanying them who try to cross over to India without clear reason. 

Police have arrested some individuals involved in human trafficking but the kingpins have yet to be brought to justice.

Unclear laws

Nepal's existing laws lack clarity over how to address the issue of human trafficking under the veil of foreign employment opportunities.  

Neither the Foreign Employment Act nor the Anti-trafficking Act fully address this new form of exploitation. The Foreign Employment Act is silent on human trafficking, while the Human Trafficking and Transportation (Control) Act does not recognise human trafficking that is purportedly for legitimate foreign employment.

The life of Nepalese housemaids in Kuwait is like hell, but even more hellish is our poverty which pushes us to follow the path to the Gulf

This creates confusion as to which law is relevant, and what action to take in these cases, so allowing the perpetrators to operate more easily.

SSP Shailesh Thapa Chhetri of the Nepal police, said the confusion between legislation that applies to cases of trafficking and that which applies to cases of trafficking for foreign employment, is advantageous to the criminals.

Sunita Danuwar, executive director of Shakti Samuha, said ordinary people and policymakers alike are confused: "A law has to be drafted to tell trafficking from fraud in the name of employment," said Danuwar.

The Anti-Trafficking Act defines human trafficking as selling people for sexual exploitation and does not cover trafficking for foreign employment. The Foreign Employment Act says that selling people abroad under the cover of employment amounts to "fraud by individuals or recruitment agencies". 

Yet when people are sold into foreign jobs, the traffickers and their agents face less serious penalties under the Foreign Employment Law than they would get under the Anti-Trafficking Act. Trafficking charges can result in imprisonment for twenty years; a sentence for foreign employment fraud ranges from three to seven years.

Information Officer Mohan Adhikari at the Department of Foreign Employment said there is an ongoing process to amend the Foreign Employment Act. Under-secretary Roshani Devi Karki of the Ministry of Women, Children and Social Welfare said preparations were being made to amend the Anti-Trafficking Act to clarify its ambiguities.

However, the reform process was announced in 2016 and so far there have been no concrete outcomes.

While the human traffickers are benefiting from the legal loopholes and selling girls all over the Gulf, a former victim of trafficking, Nirmala Joshi is speaking out.

"The life of Nepalese housemaids in Kuwait is like hell," she says. "But even more hellish is our poverty which pushes us to follow the path to the Gulf."

We have changed victims' names in this report to respect their privacy and protect them from repercussions. Some information from police officers and victims was also given under the condition of anonymity. We obtained information relating to the cases of some victims on condition of not publishing the full account and details, so they are quoted in part only. 

Dilliraj Bista, who was superintendent of police in Kanchanpur District has now been suspended over the mishandling of a rape case.

Pramod Acharya is a leading investigative journalist from Nepal and an assistant editor at the Centre for Investigative Journalism in Kathmandu.

He has produced several groundbreaking investigations on human trafficking, public health and malpractice in academia. Pramod, a Dart Center fellow (2017) at Columbia University, New York, is now studying Journalism at the University of Illinois.

Follow him on Twitter: @acharyapramod