08/01/2021
Telangana: Migrant workers lose Gulf jobs in pandemic, stare at bleak future | Cities News,The Indian Express
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Kaagaz: Pan
distressingly
In the last couple of months, Parkipandla's organisation has been on a ‘Gulf Bharosa Yatra,’ visiting gulf
returnees to offer help and support.
As scores of Indian migrant workers got stuck in the Gulf when the coronavirus
pandemic broke out early last year, forty-four-year-old Mamda Ashok considered
himself lucky. For 12 years, Ashok, who hails from Telangana’s Nirmal district, had
been working in Kuwait. It was just before the pandemic-induced lockdown came
into effect that he was sanctioned a three-month holiday from the car wash station
where he worked.
Come February 26, Ashok will complete a year being out of employment. He did not
receive months of pending salary and end-of-service benefits. Like Ashok, over
20,000 migrant workers from across Telangana have lost their jobs in the Gulf
owing to the pandemic and face an uncertain future, says Swadesh Parkipandla,
president of Pravasi Mitra Labour Union.
Read |The long walk of India’s migrant workers in Covid-hit 2020
Ashok, who now lives with his wife back home, said: “I have studied only till class 4.
The only reason why I worked for so many years in the Gulf, despite the hardships,
was the money. Though I was earning only around Rs 12,000 a month, the fact
remains that I am yet to pay up Rs 2 lakh out of the Rs 7 lakh loan I took to go
there.”
https://indianexpress.com/article/cities/hyderabad/telangana-migrant-workers-lose-gulf-jobs-in-pandemic-7136584/
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