No Man's Land Our World

in the UK without a home, work or an identity. And then he goes to

their home villages to find out what makes them want to leave.

Every year, thousands of Indian men leave the fields of the Punjab to

make their fortune in Britain. They pay human traffickers thousands of

dollars to smuggle them from India into the UK. When they arrive, this

is what they get. Britain's economic downturn has left

thousands of illegal workers in poverty. Hundreds are sleeping

rough. TRANSLATION: I would rather God took me and then I would be OK.

For many, life on the streets is taking its toll. Where do you get

money? Shoplifting. Outside it is very cold. They are illegal, in

Britain and desperate to get back home. But they are stuck in a

Punjab. It is one of India's richest states. They call it the

fruit basket of India. Fertile soil has made it a development success

story. The other big export has been people. In the first decades

after independence, hundreds of thousands of Punjabis settled in

the UK. They are skilled and unskilled workers and have been

encouraged to migrate and fill gaps in the British workforce. Today,

the criteria they must meet for a visa is much tougher. But the

desire to head to Britain is almost a way of life for every young

Punjabi. They want wealth like this. Punjab's palaces dominate what were

significant villages. They are holiday homes, built with the

savings of first and second- generation Indians that settled in

Britain. This monument of wealth has been built by two Coventry

brothers. On the rooftops of these policies, a tribute to the aircraft

that took their grandparents and parents to the UK. They left this

fertile land to earn greater wealth. 6,500 kilometres away, in Britain.

And it is that wealth that has inspired tens of thousands of young

men from the farming communities to head to Britain to make their

fortune. In fact, I have been told that in the villages in this

district, we have just got a handful of young men left. Women

and children are left to work in the fields. Much of this land has

been remortgaged to pay for the journey the remaining young men

here will soon make. They are not entitled to British visas. Locals

call them foot soldiers. In this context, it is a man without an

identity because he works abroad illegally. But the global economic

climate has changed. People already in the UK have warned them. They

say there is no work there and no point in coming, he tells me, but

they are willing to believe things have changed in Britain. We still

wants to see what it is like, I am told. Just getting there involves

certain risk. Bila has tried and failed, and told me so-called

agents arrange black market visas to Russia, Europe and Africa, where

they are supposed to be picked up by traffickers. TRANSLATION: First

I went to Moscow. There were three of us and an agent said we would be

met at the airport, but nobody came and we were stuck at the airport.

He has been sent on wasted trips to Thailand, Germany, Vietnam and

Nigeria. TRANSLATION: They just wanted the money. I was conned.

Agents charge up to $1,500 for a visa and traffickers services and

there are no refunds. In Delhi, we tracked down three Punjabi men who

have paid massive sums of money to an agent that promised to get them

to Britain. They have agreed to meet me in this room that they are

staying in, provided by the agent, all part of the package. They live

and stay here until they have got the visas ready. Hello, I am Chris.

Hello. How do you do? This is where you are sleeping? And you share

this bed? They have been living here for more than one month,

waiting for their black market visas. Sukha is all too aware of

the risks they are taking. TRANSLATION: My family is already

financially stretched and we have lost money already. I hope to get

out there and make back the money we have lost. They hope to settle

in Southall in west London, a predominantly Asian area.

TRANSLATION: What I have heard and what I have been told is that

Punjabis are there and they will have support. In other countries we

do not have our own people. This community is already in Britain and

that makes it attractive as well? TRANSLATION: That is it. You think

a Punjabi will help a Punjabi. What do you expect when you get to

Britain? How do you imagine it to be? I will go there and when I am

sorted I will bring my family over. First I will set myself up like

other people. That is my dream. Traffickers are cashing in on their

dreams. They will not warn India's fojis that the economic downturn is

no longer a land of opportunity. Sukha, Bila and Jaga hope to be

here in a few weeks, in Little India in Southall in west London.

It is home to a big South Asian population, one of the biggest

concentrations outside India. In the past 20 years, illegal

immigrants from India have added to the population. For new arrivals,

life here is tough. From sunrise, hundreds of illegal immigrants

descend on the train station car park. It is a regular pick-up point

for cheap and illegal labour. We filmed for hours. But the good

times are over. A lack of work is pushing illegal workers into the

very poverty they had hoped to escape. They live here, in

Britain's 21st century slums. Across Southall, 200,000 badly

constructed buildings are hidden at the end of suburban gardens. They

call them sheds with beds. Many are built without planning permission

and others are converted garages. This is just one street and at the

end of each garden we have got brick buildings like best. -- like

this. They have got windows and doorways leading to this alleyway

and they go on and on. Inside, the accommodation is basic. It is all

these illegal immigrants can afford. TRANSLATION: We can barely make

ends meet. It has been two months and we have worked only four days.

What can we do? We have to pay the landlord. There are five of us and

we club together to pay. Their rent, $1,200 per month. Punjabi landlords

risk housing illegal immigrants but at an inflated price. They have

been told not to open the door to anybody in case they are authority

officials or immigration officers. But we got inside posing as

volunteers. We brought food and blankets. They complain of damp and

cramped conditions, but what angers them most is exploitation by their

own people. People that are here legally, permanent residents have

made homes here and have paid for their houses because of us.

Mortgages are paid. They charge a high rent and everybody living here

is Punjabi. Rows of terraced housing are hiding sheds with beds

for illegal immigrants. Many immigrants we have spoken to are

paying hundreds of dollars every month to live in squalid, illegal

Specialist teams made up of construction regulation officers

and immigration officials are investigating Britain's sheds with

beds. There are an estimated 10,000 illegal dwellings in sheds, garages

and outbuildings across London and the Home Counties. Councils have

detected the biggest numbers in the boroughs of Ealing and Slough. What

are they actually doing to deal with this growing number of so-

called sheds with beds? Local authorities have said they are

often hampered by legislation, meaning they must give 24 hours of

notice before inspection of property. Plenty of time to conceal

evidence. The BBC has made evidence available to the authorities.

Increasing numbers of illegal immigrants are giving up on life in

Britain. But getting home is not Down here? Is this where you sleep?

That is my bedroom. His family paid $15,000 to traffickers to smuggle

him into Britain. He came from India for a better life. This is

what he got. Out of work and penniless, he has found refuge in a

derelict garage. TRANSLATION: When I left and came here I was told

life was good here. It is not just me. Other people came for work. You

can see the state we are in. We have not got work, government help.

He has cut himself off from his family and would rather they

thought he was dead and living like this. -- than living like this.

When you get here there is nothing. No work, no money. What can I say

to my family back home? The money TRANSLATION: They told me that when

I have been here a while, I can get papers and stay. But those are all

stories. I did not get anything, a house or a job. Now he is pleading

to go home. He must prove his identity. And that can take years.

There are thousands of others stuck in the same bureaucratic no-man's-

land. We found dozens bedding down Every day they spend in this misery,

they slip further into a destructive cycle.

It is now midnight, and nearly all of the men that live under this

bridge have gone to bed, wrapping themselves in duvets and jumpers to

try and keep warm. The temperature at the moment is freezing. They

have got another six hours here before they will get up and head

into the centre of Southall in the hope of finding work. The

atmosphere here is very intense, as you can hear. There are a lot of

people who have been drinking all day. Some of them are clearly

taking drugs as well. It is a very In India, my life is better.

This 21-year-old man was jailed for shoplifting. Now he is back on the

streets and on heroin. I told him to send me back, but they do not. I

do not have a passport or any papers. Where do you get the money

to buy drugs? Shoplifting. I cannot These two men have found refuge on

buses. They tell me that many of the drivers are Punjabi, and they

let them sleep on the bus during How long have you been sleeping on

the bus? Seven months. Do the They will travel from Southall to

central London and back six times The only form of help available are

The Sikh Welfare Awareness Team claimed the British government's

repatriation scheme is overwhelmed, forcing increasing numbers of

The areas that we find these people sleeping in are mainly in

graveyards, in parks, in disused garages, derelict houses, dustbins.

I have known cases drag on for years. Literally years. Do some of

them give up hope of ever going back home? Lots and lots of them

The Indian High Commission in London and the UK Border Agency say

that establishing the true identity of these men can be complex. And

the time it takes to issue emergency travel documentation and

But UK Home Office figures reveal that voluntary departures by

illegal immigrants from the UK to all countries have risen steadily

over the past six years, from 335 in 2005 to nearly 13,000 in 2011.

Welcome to this man's bathroom, in a cemetery. He has been stuck in

the system for three years. In better times, he earned hundreds of

dollars a week as a plumbing engineer. The now he says they have

nothing does she has no been to TRANSLATION: They have got a

photocopy of my passport. What what will I do if I go back? My brothers

have shared out the land between themselves and my parents are dead.

Life on the streets is taking its toll. He has considered suicide.

would rather God took me. Then I would be OK. No one listens to me.

He told me he hopes his story will act as a warning. He hopes some

good can come from his miserable existence.

So, back in Delhi, we are taking his message to the people that need

it most. These three are on standby to be traffic to Britain. They are

about to see the reality of life there.

What I am about to show you is the area where you will probably end up

As they watch the footage, the risk they are taking dawns on them.

TRANSLATION: We have to take a bit of a risk and do it to stay

together. We have to do it. We need the money. Does it worry you that

you are paying �10,000 to traffickers and agents to take it

to Britain to end up living in somewhere very similar to where you

are staying now? -- to take you to Britain. If this is true then I

think we will be stuck if we go there. That accommodation is among

the best accommodation for illegal immigrants from India. Many have

lost work, they have got no money, they cannot afford a shed with a

bed. So they are now living on the street. I am not going. They look

in a really bad state. That is enough. Do not show us any more.

Did your agent warn you that this is a possibility if you do not find

work? You could live on the street? We are going to talk to him to say

we want our money back. He will not give it, we will have to fight with

him to get it back. For thousands of people, it is too

late. The true extent of his downfall has never been revealed to

his family. He wants all families in his village to know. His

brothers and sister-in-law have not seen him for 17 years. The family

agreed to meet me, knowing I have some news about him. One of his

brothers is working illegally in Italy. I am welcomed by his older

brother. His nephews are also there. These old photographs are the only

insight they have had into his life. They tell me he repaid the loan

that funded his journey while working in Germany, then Holland.

In the UK, nobody earned as much as him, his brother tells me. The

villagers called him a hero. The legacy of his hard work. Two family

homes built with his hard-earned cash. On the roof, the traditional

tribute to the vehicle that took him to Britain. Both houses are

incomplete. Four years ago, the money stopped coming. A clear sign

that he was struggling. But until now, they had no idea just how bad

TRANSLATION: What makes me so sad is that he is suffering so much

hardship. What is the point of living if life is like that? If he

is living like that, it is better that he came home. At least here he

will be able to eat well. He has a room to sleep in and will get

everything he needs. I am so upset that he sleeps under a bridge and

hangs around in a cemetery. What is the point of his life? It would be

better if he came back home to his family. We will find all his ID