Lawsuit claiming forced Indian labor at Robbinsville temple expands nationwide

ROBBINSVILLE - A class action lawsuit that alleges that a massive religious temple in Robbinsville was constructed with forced labor has expanded to include all five of the religious sect’s major centers in the U.S.

The civil suit, filed in New Jersey federal court in early May, was amended in late October to include workers who have worked on temples near Los Angeles, Chicago, Houston and Atlanta. See the full suit at the bottom of this story.

The organization, Bochasanwasi Shri Akshar Purushottam Swaminarayan Sanstha Inc., or BAPS, has been accused of trafficking hundreds of laborers from India and forcing them to work in dangerous conditions on pay well below minimum wage, seven days a week with one day off every month.

The workers arrived in the U.S. under R-1 visas or religious visas meant for volunteers, according to the lawsuit.

Paul Fishman, attorney for BAPS, said in an email, "U.S. Government officials have authorized the use of R-1 visas for stone artisans for 20 years, and federal, state, and local government agencies have regularly visited and inspected all of the construction projects on which those artisans volunteered."

Workers were prohibited from speaking to outside visitors and could not leave on their own volition, according to the lawsuit, and they often slept on temple grounds and their passports were confiscated at the airport upon arrival into the U.S.

One worker died at the Robbinsville temple and three other workers died shortly after returning to India, according to the lawsuit.

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When applying for visas, the workers were coached by recruiters in India to tell U.S. Embassy officials that they were volunteers who were traveling to the U.S. to decoratively paint or carve stones at the temples, the lawsuit claims. However, according to the lawsuit, most, if not all, of the decorative paintings or carvings were completed in India and the stones arrived in the U.S. already carved.

Instead, workers across locations “had to manage stones that weighed several tons (and) they were exposed to and breathed dust from cut stones and chemical solutions used to soak the stone,” the lawsuit says.

The lawsuit alleges that prospective laborers were led to believe that they would be working four to seven hours per day for 20 to 25 days every month. Recruiters did not specify pay, but had the workers sign contracts that sometimes were only in English, a language most, if not all of the laborers did not understand, according to the lawsuit.

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In New Jersey, pay could amount to $1.20 an hour for 12- or 13-hour work days, and workers were docked pay as fines for breaking work rules, according to the lawsuit. On average, workers were paid about $450 per month. Workers were only given $50 in cash per month, with the rest of their pay transferred to the worker’s bank accounts in India, which they could not access in the U.S. The lawsuit said some of the funds were sent with the note “SALARY.”

In California and Illinois, workers were found to work 8-hour days with as little as $194 per month in pay. In Georgia, a worker worked 8-hour days with pay that amounted to $335 per month. In Texas, workers worked 8-hour days for about $600 per month, according to the lawsuit.

The lawsuit alleges that the workers “performed solely manual — not religious — labor at the temples (and) nearly all were not members of (BAPS’s) denomination, and they were not volunteers.”

Workers who arrived in the U.S. allegedly did not have a choice in the location they would end up working at. And some workers were transferred from temple to temple, according to the lawsuit. Some laborers began working on the temples as early as 2003.

The lawsuit says at least 200 workers in New Jersey and 100 workers in each of the four other states were trafficked and forced to work grueling hours with minimal pay.

“The R-1 workers were completely dependent on the (BAPS) and their agents for long periods of time,” the lawsuit states. “(BAPS) and their agents exercised significant control over (the) workers during the time that they traveled to and were in New Jersey.”

The lawsuit is looking to address worker compensation and charge BAPS with racketeering and fraud.

BAPS lawsuit by Asbury Park Press on Scribd

Olivia Liu is a reporter covering transportation, Red Bank and western Monmouth County. She can be reached at oliu@gannett.com.

This article originally appeared on Asbury Park Press: Robbinsville temple forced labor lawsuit expands to other sites