Six construction workers from the State, who were recruited for painting work in Romania and remained stranded for one year, returned to the city with tales of personal hardship. The six said they were hired for painting work through a private recruitment agency and assured a salary of ₹40,000 a month. But they were made to do odd cleaning jobs. They were removed from their jobs within two months of joining a construction site and were left homeless and penniless. The labourers, who survived doing odd jobs, were finally rescued and brought to the State, thanks to the efforts of Pon Kumar, president of the Tamil Nadu Construction Workers Central Union.
Mr. Kumar, who was earlier chairman of the T.N. Construction Workers’ Welfare Board, said the six labourers were brought back after representations were made to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar and the Romanian Embassy. The workers hailed from different parts of the State including Poonamallee, Chidambaram, Needamangalam, Thanjavur and Thoothukudi.
M. Udayakumar, a native of Thoothukudi, pouring out his woes, said after they were removed from the jobs they took refuge in the refugee camp of the Indian Embassy where they were provided food and shelter. He said after four months the embassy officials, citing their inability to help them return to Tamil Nadu, asked them to leave. Somehow the group survived by doing some odd jobs and from a shelter provided by a good Samaritan in Romania before Mr. Kumar took up the case.
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The six workers, who reached New Delhi on November 8 and were kept in quarantine due to the COVID-19 pandemic, thanked Rajeev Sharma, Regional Policy Officer of BWI, for sponsoring them with the train tickets to reach home.