Manjusha OM, an Indian domestic worker from Kerala, returned home empty-handed from Saudi Arabia, with a shattered mind and bruises on her body, after working like a slave for eight months. She was beaten up by her Arab employer for ‘disobedience’ during her 20-hour-long duty and had to eat from garbage bins to keep herself […]
Category: Migrant Labor
Nepali migrant workers are trapped in a vicious cycle of debt and exploitation due to a failure by authorities to crack down on recruitment firms that charge illegally high fees for jobs abroad, human rights group Amnesty International said on Monday. Wages sent back by an estimated four million Nepalis – mainly employed working in […]
In the Churu city of Rajasthan, India, a family of 10 is desperately worried. Six years ago, Yousuf Ali*, the third of eight siblings, took a loan to leave for Riyadh to work as part of Empower Contracting, a subsidiary of the construction business Saudi Binladen Group. The dream to support his family did not […]
Rajayah Yenkampally, a 43-year-old native of the southern Indian state of Andhra Pradesh, is on a train home from Mumbai. “I Landed at Mumbai airport from Kuwait today (Saturday). Still it hurts. I have 22 stitches in my head.” Yenkampally, who migrated to Kuwait in 2016 on a domestic worker visa, was forced to work […]
The oil rich country with its luxurious lifestyle and cuisine from around the world is a perfect holiday destination. But beneath the glitz and glamour there’s a dark side as thousands of migrant laborers toil away, hidden, always under surveillance of local forces. The migrant workers often forego wages they are entitled to and don’t […]
Muhammad, wide-eyed and hopeful, joined millions of other migrants from Pakistan and India who arrived in the Gulf with dreams in their eyes, ready for the promise of an improved household economy. However, life in Dubai ended up being a disappointment. Muhammad would wake up at 4 am to work, and come back by 8 […]
Gireesh Kumar, an engineer from the south Indian state of Kerala at a company in Qatar, is quite hopeful as the Qatari government is initiating wide-ranging reforms in its labour system to protect and respect migrant workers’ rights. Gireesh who joined an oil company in Qatar some two years ago was betrayed by the recruitment […]
Ram was sent to Malaysia by an agent from his village in Dhanusa, and is currently in Kathmandu en route to Dubai. When asked if he used the same agent for Dubai as he did for Malaysia, he replied: “Despite arranging a good job for me in Malaysia, I did not trust him because his […]
Zhob had a very simple life we were 5 sisters and 4 brothers so I had 8 siblings My dad was doing labour in zhob as you know day by day expenses are compounding .I was in very cryptic sphere I used to get distraught whilst looking at my younger sibling that what will be […]
Manjusha Om, a 38-year-old divorcee from Kerala and mother of two girl children aged 14 and 8, emigrated to Saudi Arabia to earn little extra money last March. But last week, she returned to Palode, a small village in the foothills of the Western Ghat mountain ranges in Thiruvananthapuram, empty handed with scars of physical […]