Bizman Detained in Iran Is Back Home in Nanded

Before travelling to any foreign country, make sure you thoroughly understand its laws Yogesh Panchal Entrepreneur

- Pradip Kumar Maitra

NAGPUR: It was Yogesh Panchal's first overseas trip. So, naturally, one of the first things the 33-year-old entrepreneur did after checking into his hotel was take a tour of the sights. He took the mandatory selfies, clicked pictures of the big-ticket tourist attractions, and sent them via WhatsApp to his wife, relatives and friends back home in India.

Then Yogesh returned to his hotel room. "I was talking to my wife over a WhatsApp call, when suddenly some plain-clothes people came to my room, blindfolded me, and took me away for an inquiry."

What Yogesh hadn't factored in was that he was visiting Tehran, capital of one of the world's most secretive nations, where censorship is a way of life. On his phone were images of what Iran considers sensitive locations such as the Milad Tower, a telecommunications tower, and other notable sights. The authorities had learnt of this via the VPN app that must be downloaded by every visitor to Iran, and flagged it as a security concern. So they decided to detain him.

Yogesh is back home in Wasmat, a sleepy outpost in Nanded district, in Maharashtra, after spending two months in detention centres in Iran. He was detained on December 7 and returned to Nanded via a flight to Mumbai on Tuesday.