A Plea For Help: To The Saudi Minister - Alleviate The Suffering Of Over 800 Stranded Foreigners
12 August 2016By Tariq A. Al-Maeena
A plea for help in the form of a tweet sent by a desperate Indian guest worker
in the Kingdom to the Indian external affairs minister set in motion a series
of events that have generated wide publicity across many borders.
The man appealed for the minister's intervention to alleviate the suffering of
over 800 of his countrymen who had been left high and dry with nothing to
sustain them after the companies that had hired them refused to compensate
them for their services for the past seven months. He stated that they had not
eaten for three days in Jeddah, and asked for the minister's personal
intervention.
In the passing days, it became evident that the initial number did not reflect
the true magnitude of the problem as some 10,000 Indians as claimed by the
Indian minister were languishing under similar conditions. The dire situation
has been intensified by the loss of major contracts by several large companies
heavily involved in developing the Kingdom's infrastructure. Once the
companies began internal cutbacks, the first sacrifices were the salaries of
lower level employees. The situation was worsened when some 800,000 workers in
Kuwait fell victim to similar tactics.
The minister reacted by ordering the Indian Consulate in Jeddah to keep
abreast of the situation and immediately rectify the dire conditions facing
the stranded Indian nationals. She tweeted: ''Large number of Indians have
lost their jobs in Saudi Arabia and Kuwait. The employers have not paid wages,
closed down their factories. As a result our brothers and sisters in Saudi
Arabia and Kuwait are facing extreme hardship. The number of Indian workers
facing food crisis in Saudi Arabia is over ten thousand. I assure you that no
Indian worker rendered unemployed in Saudi Arabia will go without food. I am
monitoring this on hourly basis.''
Urging the Indian community to help these workers, the minister tweeted an
extraordinary appeal to all Indians living in the Kingdom. ''I appeal to 3
million Indians in Saudi Arabia. Please help your fellow brothers and
sisters,'' she tweeted.
The Indian Consulate immediately began to look for ways to provide relief to
all the stranded workers. It is commendable that in spite of the odds and with
strong support from the Indian community, the Consulate's timely intervention
ensured that the workers' immediate needs of being fed were met successfully.
Indian Consul General Mohammed Noor Rahman Sheikh stated: ''For now the food
requirement for one week has been taken care of. However, the process of
feeding them will continue until a solution is found.'' According to reports,
some 16,000 kg of food was distributed to Indians who were on the verge of
starvation.
Some major Saudi companies decided to pitch in to help out. The Indian Consul
General announced in Jeddah that a Saudi company, after learning of the plight
of the workers, had offered to accept 1,000 workers on their payroll with
immediate effect. Two other Saudi employers also expressed interest in
employing some of these jobless workers, according to the CG who added that it
was evident that ''there is no dearth of Saudi philanthropists''. The Saudi
government will investigate complaints against the guilty parties for not
paying wages and will take appropriate action once the findings are in.
Meanwhile, the Indian government is formulating a plan to evacuate a large
number of jobless Indians from the Gulf region and India's Minister of State
for External Affairs VK Singh has been tasked to travel to Saudi Arabia to put
in place an evacuation process which is due to begin soon.
Until the time when they are indeed evacuated, we should collectively ensure
that these workers will no longer suffer and I ask all of our countrymen and
other nationals to pitch in and help out our Indian brothers in their time of
need. They were victims and if we want to right a wrong, the least we can do
is help the Indian diplomatic missions in the country provide sustenance to
these unfortunate workers. Any form of assistance would be greatly
appreciated.
We are all members of the human race and it is the Islamic way of doing the
right thing.
— The author can be reached at talmaeena@aol.com. Follow him on Twitter @talmaeen
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