The weather was incredibly cold. The fingers shivered while the legs trembled. Soon the wind began to blow, only to be worsened by rain within moments. The house was almost roofless. The middle part of the ceiling was considerably broken that let wind and water come directly into the room without a stop.Mahtab, Shamshad, Anil, and a number of other Indian immigrants had to go through this ordeal ceaselessly almost every day. They complained against the impoverished conditions of lodging to the concerned authorities but their plea fell to deaf ears.A number of times they tried to escape the tragedy but each attempt resulted into further brutality by the employers. They cried and wept but the anguish of pain could not be heard as they were staying far away...thousands of kilometers from their homeland.The incident came to light through social media - that a group of nearly forty unskilled workers from the state of Bihar were trapped in a construction company in Al-Jubail in Saudi Arabia The frustrated labourers had recorded their ordeal with one of their friend's mobile, and secretly smuggled the content out...only to be circulated through various social networks. They sobbed: "Please help us out of this hell. We are trapped in Saudi Arabia. We are treated worse than animals...not to be allowed to go out of the huge construction complex in Al-Jubail". They wailed: "Our passports are seized by the company and we are made to work like a donkey for sixteen hours".Officially they were promised a salary of 1200 Saudi Riyals with free food, lodging and one month of leave on completion of two-year contract. Upon arrival in the Kingdom, the truth was just opposite. They were paid only 600 Riyals, that too after six months of hard work, with provision of food included into that. They could hardly manage to live.What surprised them more, causing immense distress, was that they were not allowed to travel to India before the completion of the so-called five-year old contract ... a forgery of original two-year contract which they had signed before they could start their journey of ambition to Kingdom.If workers wanted to resign from job before the completion of five-year forged contract, they had to pay 800 Saudi Riyals as bribery to escape misfortune. With meager salary in hand, the amount was impossible for them to manage, thus plight remaining their perpetual fate.Thousands of people suffer from this form of modern slavery in Gulf countries. In most of the cases, the individuals are duped into false hope of dream opportunities abroad. With no proper mechanism to safeguard the exploitation and ill-treatment of vulnerable workers, often the host countries in Gulf take no legal notice of such abuses. Individuals are left to confront challenges on their own.The reasonable way to avoid such tragic situations is not to rush blindly for a job in a foreign land. It is imperative to verify the existing offers, more importantly to check the track-record of the company. To add wisely, one should also never underestimate the offer of a job at hand in one's own country. A penny earned with dignity in India is far better than a dollar paid in ignominy abroad.