The woes of Indian immigrants in the Gulf countries seem to have multiplied with the drop in oil prices, and there are indications that a large number may be forced to return home.
Kerala Chief Minister Oommen Chandy said on Friday: “The global trends in economy indicate that the employment opportunities in the Gulf sector may diminish and reforms like Nitaquat [a law that makes it mandatory for companies in Saudi Arabia to hire one Saudi national for every 10 migrant workers] may force [workers in the Gulf] to return to the home country.”
The region is the most important for India because seven million Indians live there. Kerala alone accounts for Rs. 60,000 crore a year in remittances from this region.
At a session on ‘Issues of Labour and Employment in Gulf Countries,’ K.V. Shamsuddin, a Dubai-based NRI, said only five per cent of the returning immigrants had the means of looking after their families. The reverse migration had already begun; and if the trend continued, India, especially Kerala, would face the major issue of their rehabilitation.
Addressing a gathering on the concluding day of the Pravasi Bharatiya Divas, Mr. Chandy said: “We must think about how we can rehabilitate those who are returning to India and in what way we can make use of their expertise for their benefit. The government of Kerala has chalked out a rehabilitation package, but lack of resources is our problem in implementing it effectively.”
“Indian workers are living in pathetic conditions. Their labour is exploited… They are given hope and then cheated. India has not demanded the dignity of pay, like the Philippines. It would be difficult to hire Filipino workers at a low salary, but Indians get paid only 500-600 dirhams,” Prakash Sebastian, a Dubai-based surgeon, told The Hindu.
The issue of Indians languishing in UAE jails was also raised at the session. Syed Akbaruddin, spokesperson of the Ministry of External Affairs, said India was working with countries in the Gulf and elsewhere for a prisoner exchange system. It already had an arrangement with the UAE, under which Indian prisoners could be transferred to Indian jails for completing their sentence. An agreement had been signed with Saudi Arabia, but it had not been ratified.
