‘Do you know Shah Rukh Khan?’: Indian worker kidnapped by Sudan’s RSF militia

DUBAI: An Indian man from Odisha has been kidnapped by Sudan’s paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), according to reports from NDTV.

Sudan remains engulfed in one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises since fighting broke out last year between the RSF and the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF).

The abducted Indian national has been identified as Adarsh Behera, 36, a native of Jagatsinghpur district in Odisha. He had been working in Sudan since 2022 for the Sukarati Plastic Factory, located in the conflict-ridden Darfur region.

A video sent to NDTV shows Behera seated between two RSF soldiers. One of them can be heard asking him in English, “Do you know Shah Rukh Khan?” Another soldier behind him prompts him to say, “Dagalo good,” referring to Mohammed Hamdan Dagalo, known as Hemeti, the commander of the RSF.

According to NDTV sources, Behera was kidnapped from El Fashir, the capital of North Darfur, roughly 1,000km west of Khartoum. He is believed to have been taken to Nyala, the capital of South Darfur and an RSF stronghold about 1,200km from the Sudanese capital.

In another video shared by his family with NDTV, Behera is seen sitting on the floor with folded hands, appealing for help. “I am here in El Fashir where the situation is very bad. I have been living here for two years with great difficulty. My family and children are very worried. I request the state government to help me,” he says.

Behera’s wife, Susmita, said the couple have two sons, aged eight and three. “He had told me conditions were worsening, but we never imagined something like this could happen,” she told NDTV. The family has appealed to both the Odisha government and the Indian Ministry of External Affairs to intervene for his safe release.

Sudan’s ambassador to India, Dr Mohammed Abdalla Ali Eltom, told NDTV that the situation in Darfur remains volatile and unpredictable. “As you can expect, there is a complete communication blackout in El Fashir. No one can contact anyone in the city right now. We hope he is not harmed or hurt in any way. This is a very unstable situation, but we are doing what we can and hope to see him return safely,” the envoy said.

Sudan has been in turmoil since April 2023, when tensions between the country’s two most powerful generals — Gen Abdul Fattah Al Burhan of the SAF and Gen Mohammed Hamdan Dagalo of the RSF — erupted into open conflict. Once allies who jointly led a coup in 2021, their rivalry has since devastated the nation, displacing more than 13 million people and pushing millions toward famine.

El Fashir, where Behera was abducted, has seen some of the fiercest battles in the Darfur region. With communication lines severed and humanitarian corridors blocked, aid groups have called it one of the hardest places to reach in Sudan’s ongoing civil war.