KUALA LUMPUR: An Indian man, blinded in one eye after his employer splashed acid on his face, is set to receive a compensation running into lakhs of rupees following an order by a Malaysian court after a 12-year legal battle.

Guruminder Singh, 53, was forced to remain in Malaysia for over a decade in connection with the court case. Singh's employer, Mender Kaur, was said to have splashed acid on his face when he asked for salary. In 1997, a session's court had ordered her to pay RM62,000 (about Rs seven lakh) in damages for loss of sight, unpaid wages and other costs.

Kaur and two others named in the suit, Surjit Kaur and Hari Singh, filed an appeal with the High Court, but this was thrown out in 1999. In the same year, Singh's lawyers filed a bankruptcy order against Mender Kaur as she could not pay the sum, media reports said here today. In a recent order, High Court Justice Sulaiman Daud directed that a single-storey house owned by Mender Kaur be auctioned off so that Singh would receive his compensation.

Sulaiman said Kaur, who ran a transport company, had acted fraudulently by transferring the property to her brother's name to avoid paying Singh. Singh's counsel said the sum owed to his client now stood at 81,982.69 ringgit.

The man, who spent almost 10 years in detention because his employer had his work permit cancelled, hopes he will be able to get his compensation sorted out quickly. "I yearn to return to Punjab.

I am afraid that my two children would not recognize me," Singh said. Immigration authorities, who sympathized with Singh, had allowed him to live outside the detention centre.

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