New York: More than 100 Indian workers at a Mississippi shipyard staged a walkout claiming they were victims of human trafficking and lived and worked in abysmal conditions.

The workers plan to report themselves to the Department of Justice as trafficking victims and demand federal prosecution of the employer, Signal International, a local television channel WLOX-TV reported.

They claim they were lured to come on H2B visas for temporary workers to Pascagoula shipyard run by Signal after Hurricane Katrina caused worker shortage.

The TV channel quoted Saket Soni, director of the New Orleans Workers' Centre for Racial Justice, who served as an interpreter for the workers, as saying Thursday that they lived "like pigs in a cage" in a company-run "work camp".

New Orleans is a city in Louisiana, adjoining Mississippi.

"I've been a guest worker all my life. I've never seen these kinds of conditions," said Soni, contending that the workers stayed 24 people to a room, for which the company deducted $1,050 a month from their pay cheques".