Over 5000 Indians Stranded As Kuwait’s Largest Construction Firm Falls
Migrant workers have been stuck in the Gulf country for over 18 months, without food, water or adequate shelter
“For the last 18 months, Embassy officials and ministers are coming and going. We hear the same words. We will be rescued soon, help is on the way, no need to worry… But now we are scared that we will die here without seeing our family.”
These were the words of a group of Indian workers who were left in the lurch by Kharafi National Company, one of the largest construction companies in Kuwait, which has shut down its operations partially, citing economic conditions due to oil price dip.
And as a result, around 1800 Indian workers, mainly from south Indian states, who have resigned from the company, are stranded without proper food, drinking water, accommodation, money and moreover travel documents.
Additionally, around 3614 Indian workers, mainly blue-collar workers, have filed complaints to get their unpaid salary and waiting in hope for the last few months.
Stranded Indians await help, MoS VK Singh addresses stranded migrants in Kuwait
Talking to The Lede, a senior official from the Indian Embassy in Kuwait, said that the amount is quite high and there is not much hope of company paying up. “We have calculated the pending salary for the workers as 8 million Kuwaiti Dinar (approximately Rs 169.38 crore). We are trying our best to get it for the workers,” the Embassy official told The Lede.
Last week, VK Singh, Minister of State for External Affairs, visited Kuwait and held talks with Kuwaiti ministers on resolving the workers’ issue. A few months ago, MJ Akbar, another Indian Minister of State for External Affairs, had also visited Kuwait and held talks to resolve the issue.
“After the repeated ministers’ visits from the Indian government, it seems that the Kuwait government is positive in resolving the issue,” the Embassy official added.
Meanwhile, the resigned and stranded workers said that it is getting harder by the day. “I came here with great hope. Worked for more than eight years. Now, the company is not paying us for the last one year. They are saying that they don’t have money. Top level management is ‘missing’ and the mid-level guys tell us that they are helpless,” Jose P, a worker from Kerala, told The Lede. “I have a family to take care of. My boy’s engineering education is stuck due to non-payment of fees. We are totally stuck here,” Jose added.
Jose cannot leave Kuwait because his passport is held back by the company. And even if he gets it back, he has to pay around (Rs 80,000) as fine for overstaying with an expired resident card. “The company failed to renew our resident cards and now, we are suffering for that. The salary is pending. Even if we get it, we have to pay back the loans we took to survive,” Jose added.
In fact, it is illegal for employers to hold the passports of employees, and this is clearly stated in ministry resolution number 143/A/2010 in Article 1: “It is prohibited for private sector employers and oil sector employers to hold travel documents of their employees.”
But in Kuwait, which follows the Kafala system – the bonded labour system – a majority of the workers have to surrender their passport at the time of arrival itself.
An RTI query filed by The Lede, has got a response from the Indian embassy in Kuwait – revealing that it has received 2287 complaints from the Indian workers. “Out of the total number of complaints received as indicated above, around 85 per cent of them were of non-receipt of salary and 95 per cent of them (out of the total complaints) were about employer holding back passport of workers,” stated the RTI
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