This story is from January 16, 2018

HYDERABAD: Scores of Indian workers in Saudi Arabia are in dire straits and have literally been thrown on the roads due to non-payment of salaries by a company they were employed with.

The workers who hail from different states in India have also got court verdicts in their favour but the refusal of the company to pay them has driven them to despair. “We are unable to survive here and cannot go back to India without our salaries. Life has become difficult,” the workers who came out on to the roads to express their grief said. The videos were sent to TOI by the workers.

One of the workers said the company owed him Rs eight lakh and his family back home needs money to pay tuition fees for his children and house rent. “How are our families expected to survive back home in India?” the worker asked and broke into tears explaining his own difficult situation in Saudi Arabia.

Groups of Indian workers aired their grievances how they were also starving in Saudi Arabia as a result of the employer’s indifference towards their plight in several videos shot on the roads. Imtiaz, an employee of Electro Industries, Jeddah sent the videos to TOI of the workers expressing their grief and pleading to be helped in their difficult times. According to Imtiaz, apart from 170 Indian workers who were affected, there were also 250 Bangladeshis, 15 Pakistanis and 25 who belonged to the Philippines. In one video, a worker from Bihar mentions that the workers belonged to more than one company and they were deprived of their salaries.

In a letter to the Indian embassy in Riyadh, social worker Shaheen Sayyed said 83 employees had received a favourable verdict from the labour court which had also ordered the employer to make their full and final settlement and sent them to India.

“The workers are physically and mentally disturbed and two of them have expired,” she informed the embassy.

The Indian embassy in Riyadh has also responded to the letter written by social worker Shaheen Sayyed from Kuwait. The embassy asked for a few contact numbers of the aggrieved workers ‘to us to enable to talk to them and help them out’. “Needless to say that the Embassy/Consulate will extend all possible help to our distressed citizens,” the embassy said.

Protector General of India (PGE) M C Luther who also responded to the plea by Shaheen Sayyed on Twitter on Tuesday asked for more details to be sent to him about the Indian workers in Saudi Arabia stranded due to non-payment of salaries.

