Pavani Devi Sinnaiyah, 36, who was working in Al-Ghorayath, Jouf province, about 1,200 km from the capital, died under mysterious circumstances on Jan. 19.
“We have the autopsy report from the authorities confirming that the death was due to homicide,” said a senior diplomat from the Sri Lankan mission in Riyadh who did not want his name published.
He added that police detained the sponsor as a suspect in the killing.
Sinnaiyah, who was unmarried, came to the Kingdom in 2008 from Maskeliya. The diplomat said the embassy is pursuing the case by attempting to acquire power of attorney from the victim’s next of kin. If found guilty, the suspect would be at the mercy of the next-of-kin in Sri Lanka, who would either forgive him and demand blood money or insist he be put to death. The official said the maid was killed five months after she completed her two-year contract. Speculating as to the motive, the official suggested the maid and the sponsor were at odds over continuing to work for him beyond the contract period.
There have been reported cases of maids compelled against their will to continue working.
Last month, Weerawardena Hettiarachchilage Indrani Mallika Hettiarachchi, 45, was rescued from 13 years of unpaid labor and false imprisonment by orders of Jazan Gov. Prince Muhammad bin Nasser. The sponsor, who is in custody but has not been identified, says he cannot afford to pay the estimated SR60,000 in unpaid wages to the Lankan woman.
In February Kusuma Nandini, 56, also from Sri Lanka, was rescued from 15 years of slavery. She arrived in 1994 and was only paid for the first two years. The Sri Lankan Embassy called this a “record breaking” amount of time of forced unpaid labor for a Sri Lankan working in Saudi Arabia.
Other cases of forced unpaid labor and false imprisonment of Sri Lankan maids exist. In 2007, for example, Anista Marie, who was 40 at the time, was rescued from a villa in Riyadh. She had worked for 10 years, but was only paid for two. Because she needed and desired to return to Sri Lanka as quickly as possible, no case ever went to trial and Marie never recovered her back wages from her sponsor. Marie was rescued after the Saudi daughter of the woman accused of the crimes felt sympathy and helped Marie get in contact with Arab News, which took the case to police.
“Most of the disputes between the employer and the employee erupt due to the fact that the former wants his maid to stay and the latter wants to go home on completion of her contract,” said the Sri Lankan official regarding the alleged murder of Sinnaiyah.
Most cases of housemaids wanting to return home are resolved amicably, but the official said when disagreements arise, “the employer should make his own arrangements to find a suitable substitute for the maid when she completes her work contract.”
This is the second murder of a maid in Jouf province. The last incident occurred in November when a Saudi woman paid SR40,000 in blood money for the killing of Pospawalli Selladurai, 36, from Kandy. The Sri Lanka Bureau of Foreign Employment paid for the funeral expenses and an undisclosed amount of money for the family to look after the victim’s four children who live with their grandparents.
According to the Sri Lankan Embassy, there had been five such murders of maids in Jouf province over the past two years.
