vital
source of income back home, sending money to pay for daily expenses,
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housing, education and medical care. Such remittances hit a record high of $554
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guidelines Unl
billion in 2019.
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This year, however, the World Bank expects remittances to fall by 20 percent,
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which would be the sharpest decline on record. For some countries, that drop will
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be a crushing blow. In Nepal, Honduras, Haiti, Lesotho and Tajikistan, for
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instance, remittances represent more than 20% of gross domestic product. Even
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for a large economy like India, remittances are important: Last year, they
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outstripped the total amount of foreign direct investment in the country.
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In Kerala, the dependence on funds sent from abroad is a not-so-secret element
of the state's developmental success. One in every four households in the state
includes a migrant who works abroad, according to a 2018 survey.
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Ratha, the lead economist on migration and remittances at the World Bank. That's
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The migration route from Kerala to the gulf, built upon centuries of trade with the
Middle East, is so well established that is has absorbed successive generations
of the same family, like the Athekkatils. Along curving roads in the northern part
of the state, one can spot the "gulf houses" - a term for the sometimes comically
large residences that well-paid migrants build back home in Kerala.
In normal times, tens of thousands of Keralites return each year, having saved
enough money or because they're ready to come home. After the 1991 Persian
Gulf War and the 2008 nancial crisis, migrants returned involuntarily, but on a
smaller scale than what is unfolding now.
Those prior episodes demonstrate how wrenching the return can be, said Irudaya
Rajan, a professor at the Center for Development Studies and an expert on
migration from Kerala.
"They went to make money," he said, "and now they've lost everything."
--For migrants and their families, there were drawbacks well before the pandemic.
When the Athekkatil brothers talk about their father, Kumaran, it is with a sense of
respect for his sacri ces in the gulf: the extreme heat, the long hours, the
loneliness.
Kumaran left for the UAE in 1983. Unable to read or write, he had colleagues help
him write letters. He would return home only once every three years, storing up
his leave time so he could stay for two months. The ink pens and scented erasers
he brought as gifts were the envy of his sons' classmates.
But the time with his wife and children was scarce. "He was always crushed that
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he'd be leaving again soon," said Unnikrishnan, 49, the eldest of the ve brothers.
"My father lived for his family, not for himself."
68,35,655
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what is shaping up to be India's worst recession in modern history.
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Kerala received about $15 billion in remittances last year, according to Dilip
too will tax revenue, limiting the state government's ability to help people during
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more than a tenth of the state's entire economic output. As remittances fall, so
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