DAMMAM, 27 September 2004 — Eastern Province Governor Prince Muhammad ibn Fahd has intervened to resolve the labor crisis at a company in Jubail where nearly 100 workers were stranded for several months without proper documents and no salaries.
The governor has directed authorities to release the stranded workers or process their exit from the Kingdom. Prince Muhammad has left the choice to the workers to opt for release or exit.
Nearly 130 workers, mostly Indians, of Comet Contracting Establishment in Jubail did not receive their salaries for nearly a year and were virtually prisoners of their sponsor. These workers were without their valid iqama and one of the managers of the company had fled with their passports.
Arab News took up the matter with the Indian Embassy as well as the owner of the company. After a series of stories in these columns, the Indian Embassy sent their representative to the workers to probe the matter.
Later then Indian Ambassador Kamaluddin Ahmad met Prince Muhammad and urged him to intervene in the matter and resolve the crisis.
To make matters worse, the owner of the labor camp also issued an eviction order to the workers as he had not received rent for several months. In the midst of this turmoil one of the workers committed suicide triggering further panic among the workers.
The Indian Embassy, however, intervened in the camp crisis and requested the owner of the camp to allow workers to stay in the compound till the issue was settled.
In the meantime, the embassy started issuing duplicate passports to the workers, charging them SR475 for each passport. “It is a huge amount for us. We understand the embassy’s technical problem but I am sure the embassy would see our problem as well,” said Ashok, one of the unfortunate workers of Comet who is now about to join a new company in Alkhobar.
Although the worst is now over, the workers’ plight continues. They had forfeited over a year’s salary. Now they have to pay SR475 for a duplicate passport and on top of that they have to pay an additional SR2,000 for the transfer of their sponsorship and SR600 for a new iqama.
“Very few workers were fortunate to have new employers who agreed to pay their transfer fee,” said Meraj, another Indian worker from Bihar state.
A handful of workers, fed up with their financial crunch, have now decided to leave the country for good. Most of these workers came from India on an assurance from their recruiting agents as well as the sponsor that Comet was a big company involved in contract work at Saudi Aramco. They paid between 80,000 and 100,000 rupees to the recruiting agent to secure a passage to the Kingdom. But when they arrived here they found that not only the company did not have any project with Aramco, but also there was hardly any work.
