Government to evacuate jobless Indians facing financial crunch in Saudi Arabia

India is launching one of biggest operations to evacuate some 10,000 Indians from Saudi Arabia, hit by loss of jobs and food crises. Minister of state for external affairs General (rtd) VK Singh is leaving to Jeddah on Tuesday to visit the worker camps and make an on the spot assessment of the ground situation to decide about logistics and modalities of a possible repatriation. About 30 lakh Indians live and work in Saudi Arabia, a substantial amount of them being blue-collar workers.

Official sources here described situation in Saudi Arabia hit by economic slowdown as fluid and dynamic. They said some 10,000 Indian workers have been affected by the economic slow down. Out of these 3,172 in Riyadh have not been paid their salary dues for several months but were getting regular rations. Another 2,450 of them belonging to the Saudi Oger Company were housed in five camps in Jeddah, Mecca and Taif. Since July 25, the company had stopped providing meals to the workers besides defaulting on their salaries.

Lower oil prices have put increased pressure on the Saudi economy. Growth is slowing down and the fiscal situation is under pressure. According to figures available total Saudi government revenue has fallen by 42% in 2015.

Minister of external affairs Sushma Swaraj has asked diplomatic missions in Riyadh and Jeddah to urgently provide food assistance to affected workers. Another junior minister MJ Akbar is liaising with the Saudi authorities to ensure that the claims of all the Indian workers with unpaid dues are lodged and processed in accordance with law. He has also sought Saudi assistance in arranging exit visa for all Indian workers who wish to be repatriated.

Out of major evacuations over past few years, India had facilitated the return of over 7,000 of its nationals from Baghdad after the IS taking over northern Iraq. In another operations, it evacuated 3,600 citizens from Libya last year. But so far the operation to evacuate citizens from war torn Yemen has been the biggest and appreciated world over. Supervised by General VK Singh, India evacuated 6,710 persons, including 4,748 Indians and 1,962 foreign nationals.

Earlier in 1990, India's evacuation operations from Kuwait during Gulf War I entered the Guinness Book of World Records. Over 170,000 people were evacuated from Amman to Mumbai– a distance of 4,117 km- via 488 flights operated by Indian Airlines.

On Monday, when members in the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha expressed concern over the fate of these Indians, Swaraj made the statement informing them that the Indian embassy was running five camps to feed them and she had received hourly inputs till early Monday. "Not one worker of ours will go hungry. This is my assurance to the country through Parliament... We will bring all of them back to India," she said. Swaraj noted that the law there does not permit an emergency exit visa without no objection certificate from the employers who, she said, have shut their factories and left the country, leaving these employees stranded.

Akbar sought Saudi assistance

Minister of external affairs Sushma Swaraj has asked diplomatic missions in Riyadh and Jeddah to urgently provide food assistance to affected workers. Another junior minister MJ Akbar is liaising with the Saudi authorities to ensure that the claims of all the Indian workers with unpaid dues are lodged and processed in accordance with law. He has also sought Saudi assistance in arranging exit visa for all Indian workers who wish to be repatriated.