New Delhi: A senior Indian diplomat was on Wednesday night despatched to Iraq to try and secure release of 40 Indian workers kidnapped from the northern city of Mosul that was overrun by armed Sunni militants last week, as the Narendra Modi government grappled with its first major challenge—thrown at it within a month of assuming office.

The Indian workers, mostly from Punjab, were employed with a construction company based in Baghdad, said Syed Akbaruddin, the spokesperson with ministry of external affairs, on Wednesday.

The government, sworn in on 26 May, despatched Suresh Reddy, a former ambassador to Iraq, to try and secure the release of the workers, although the government did not know who their abductors were or where they were being held.

The government, which includes the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD), the ruling party in Punjab, had not yet established direct contact with the captors on Wednesday night.

“Yes, 40 Indians, who were working with the Tariq Nur AlHuda company, have been kidnapped," Akbaruddin said. But the government has not received “any call of any nature from anyone indicating about ransom or about taking of Indians in custody in Iraq", he added. “We have decided to strengthen embassy by sending a seasoned Indian diplomat Mr Suresh Reddy who will travel today (Wednesday) to Baghdad to assist the embassy in its efforts," said the spokesperson.

A former employee of Tariq Nur Alhuda told Reuters the company had told him the Indians were now safe and being moved towards Kurdish controlled areas of Iraq. Reuters was not able to independently confirm this or contact the company directly. Mosul is located about 360km northwest of capital Baghdad.

The government was taking all steps to bring back the kidnapped workers, Akbaruddin said adding that external affairs minister Sushma Swaraj had spoken to the families of some of the victims.

Rajiv Sikri, former secretary (east) in the ministry of external affairs, described the situation as a “challenge for the (Modi) government."

“It’s a difficult situation. We need to establish contact on the ground with Sunni leaders, which is why I think the government is sending back Suresh Reddy to Iraq, so that he can leverage his contacts on the ground," Sikri said.

A person familiar with the developments said that the Indian embassy in Baghdad had been in contact with the 40 workers till the weekend. This fuelled speculation that the group could’ve been snatched while trying to escape or in the process of evacuation.

Akbaruddin said India had no information about who the kidnappers were, having received scrapes of information through the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement.

“We don’t know where they are.... We are trying to get as much information possible from anyone trying to give us information from the ground. We’re getting information from aid agencies and the Iraqi government and other sources," Akbaruddin said.

The sister of one of the abducted men said he had been out of contact since last Sunday. “His phone has been switched off. We are tense and are wondering what happened to him," Gurpender Kaur told news channel CNN-IBN. “Until then, at least we were able to speak for a second or two, but now even that is not possible."

Sunni Arab militants belonging to the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) launched an offensive on 9 June, capturing Iraq’s second largest city of Mosul with a population of two million people.

According to media reports, the ISIL, who aim to establish a caliphate across the Iraqi-Syrian frontier, were advancing towards Baghdad.

It was not immediately clear why Indian workers had been targeted though Turkey’s Dogan news agency said 60 people, including workers from Turkey, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal and Turkmenistan have been taken from a hospital construction site near the oil-rich city of Kirkuk. Insurgents seized 80 Turkish nationals including diplomats, soldiers and children workers in Mosul last week.

The 40 workers are among the 100 Indians living in areas overrun by the ISIL, and India was in contact with many of them including 46 nurses who were in the town of Tikrit. In all, there are about 10,000 Indian nationals in Iraq.

Syed Akbaruddin did not say whether there were people of other nationalities who were also kidnapped or just Indians were targeted. “This is a difficult situation. We are working with the company. Also, we are trying to work with International Red Crescent which has confirmed to us (the kidnapping). But they have also indicated that at this stage they do not know the location of these 40 Indian workers who were kidnapped," Akbaruddin said.

He said that despite uncertainties, India had no plans to close down its embassy in Baghdad.

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