India Migration Report 2016: Gulf migration 9781138215702, 9781315443409

Table of contents :
Cover
Title
Copyright
Dedication
Contents
List of figures
List of tables
Preface
Acknowledgements
List of contributors
1 Deterritorialisation of Keralam: economy, society and polity
2 Resettlement of Indian transnational labour migrant families of Gulf: questions of income, neoliberal subjectivity and oikonomia
3 The need for systemic reform in migrant labour recruitment
4 Institutional strengthening of the offices of labour attachés of India in Gulf: field experiences from the United Arab Emirates and Qatar
5 Contemporary Indian labour migration in the GCC region: emerging challenges and opportunities
6 Working and living conditions of migrant workers in the GCC
7 Are India’s policies increasing the vulnerability of its female migrants in the Arab Gulf countries?
8 Coming to Qatar: a snapshot of the experience of Indian labour migrants
9 Tamil emigrants in the United Arab Emirates
10 Protection of labour migrants at destination countries: a note on the Indian Community Welfare Fund
11 A profile of second-generation Indian high school students in Kuwait
12 Gulf migration in a time of regulation: do migration controls and labour market restrictions in Saudi Arabia produce irregularity?
13 The micropolitics of Indian recruitment agencies: India-Gulf migration from a local Indian perspective
14 Gulf migration beyond the economic lens: configuring the neoliberal self
15 Evaluating population estimates for migrants in the United Arab Emirates: a demographic analysis of a migration-driven population
16 Emigration and remittances: results from the sixth Kerala migration survey
17 Contested urban landscapes: development-induced displacement, involuntary resettlement and state violence in Kochi, Kerala
18 Cross-border migration and conflicts in Assam
19 Appraisal of MGNREGP on distress migration in Andhra Pradesh
20 Factors associated with long-distance labour migration: a study on Bengali construction workers in Kerala
Index

Citation preview

India Migration Report 2016

India Migration Report 2016 discusses migration to the Persian Gulf region. This volume: • looks at contemporary labour recruitment and policy, both in India and in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries; • explores gender issues in migration to Gulf countries; and • brings together the latest field data on migrants across states in India. Part of the prestigious annual series, this volume will interest scholars and researchers of economics, development studies, migration and diaspora studies, labour studies, and sociology. It will also be useful to policymakers and government institutions working in the area. S. Irudaya Rajan is Professor at the Centre for Development Studies, Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala, India. His recent works include Politics of Migration (with A. Didar Singh, 2016), Researching International Migration (with K.C. Zachariah, 2015) and Emigration in 21stCentury India (with Krishna Kumar, 2014).

India Migration Report Editor: S. Irudaya Rajan, Centre for Development Studies, Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala, India

This annual series strives to bring together international networks of migration scholars and policymakers to document and discuss research on various facets of migration. It encourages interdisciplinary commentaries on diverse aspects of the migration experience and continues to focus on the economic, social, cultural, ethical, security, and policy ramifications of international movements of people. Also available: India Migration Report 2010 Governance and Labour Migration India Migration Report 2011 Migration, Identity and Conflict India Migration Report 2012 Global Financial Crisis, Migration and Remittances India Migration Report 2013 Social Costs of Migration India Migration Report 2014 Diaspora and Development India Migration Report 2015 Gender and Migration Forthcoming: India Migration Report 2017 Forced Migration

India Migration Report 2016 Gulf migration Edited by S. Irudaya Rajan

First published 2017 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN and by Routledge 711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2017 selection and editorial matter, S. Irudaya Rajan; individual chapters, the contributors The right of S. Irudaya Rajan to be identified as the author of the editorial material, and of the authors for their individual chapters, has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data A catalog record has been requested for this book ISBN: 978-1-138-21570-2 (hbk) ISBN: 978-1-315-44340-9 (ebk) Typeset in Sabon by Apex CoVantage, LLC

In memory of an inspirational demographer, the Late Professor Ashish Bose

Contents

List of figuresx List of tablesxii Prefacexvi Acknowledgementsxx List of contributorsxxi   1 Deterritorialisation of Keralam: economy, society and polity

1

K.N. HARILAL AND C.S. AKHIL

  2 Resettlement of Indian transnational labour migrant families of Gulf: questions of income, neoliberal subjectivity and oikonomia

23

SHAREENA BANU C.P.

  3 The need for systemic reform in migrant labour recruitment

36

RAY JUREIDINI

  4 Institutional strengthening of the offices of labour attachés of India in Gulf: field experiences from the United Arab Emirates and Qatar

48

S. IRUDAYA RAJAN AND ARYA SURESH

  5 Contemporary Indian labour migration in the GCC region: emerging challenges and opportunities GEORGE S. NAUFAL, FROILAN T. MALIT JR AND ISMAIL H. GENC

63

viii  Contents   6 Working and living conditions of migrant workers in the GCC

75

ABDOULAYE DIOP, KIEN TRUNG LE AND MICHAEL C. EWERS

  7 Are India’s policies increasing the vulnerability of its female migrants in the Arab Gulf countries?

90

RADHIKA KANCHANA

  8 Coming to Qatar: a snapshot of the experience of Indian labour migrants

106

ARJUN S. BEDI, S. IRUDAYA RAJAN AND GANESH SESHAN

  9 Tamil emigrants in the United Arab Emirates

122

CHITRA RANGANATHAN

10 Protection of labour migrants at destination countries: a note on the Indian Community Welfare Fund

133

T.L.S. BHASKAR

11 A profile of second-generation Indian high school students in Kuwait

146

NASRA M. SHAH

12 Gulf migration in a time of regulation: do migration controls and labour market restrictions in Saudi Arabia produce irregularity?

162

S. IRUDAYA RAJAN AND JOLIN JOSEPH

13 The micropolitics of Indian recruitment agencies: India-Gulf migration from a local Indian perspective

184

MARY E. BREEDING

14 Gulf migration beyond the economic lens: configuring the neoliberal self LAAVANYA KATHIRAVELU

202

Contents ix 15 Evaluating population estimates for migrants in the United Arab Emirates: a demographic analysis of a migration-driven population

218

KATHARINE A. ALLEN

16 Emigration and remittances: results from the sixth Kerala migration survey

238

K.C. ZACHARIAH AND S. IRUDAYA RAJAN

17 Contested urban landscapes: development-induced displacement, involuntary resettlement and state violence in Kochi, Kerala

255

K. INDU AND S. IRUDAYA RAJAN

18 Cross-border migration and conflicts in Assam

262

RIKIL CHYRMANG

19 Appraisal of MGNREGP on distress migration in Andhra Pradesh

281

VIJAY KORRA

20 Factors associated with long-distance labour migration: a study on Bengali construction workers in Kerala

299

Md. SELIM REJA AND BHASWATI DAS

Index313

Figures

4.1

Hierarchy of officials at the Indian missions abroad50 5.1 Share of Indian migrants by destination 65 5.2 Remittance inflows to India by source of money66 5.3 Share of remittance inflows to India by source of money66 5.4a Average cost of remitting via banks to India in percentages70 5.4b Average cost of remitting via money transfer operators to India in percentages 71 6.1 If you had known about these difficulties before you came to (this country), would you still have 82 decided to move here? 6.2 How satisfied are you with how your employer treats you at your workplace? 84 6.3 Would you like to be living in (this country) one year from now, or do you hope to be living in someplace else by then? 85 6.4 Do you intend to seek to renew your contract in (this country), or in another country? 85 8.1 Likelihood of signing new contract against wages111 8.2 Distribution of hours worked per week 114 8.3 Distribution of monthly wages (QAR) 115 8.4 Likelihood of salary delays against wages 117 8.5 Likelihood of passport retention against wages118 8.6 Distribution of educational status conditional on passport retention status 118

Figures xi 10.1 Protective measures at all stages of migration cycle 138 10.2 Existing measures at all stages of migration cycle 141 13.1 Background process of recruitment according to MOIA186 13.2 Reality 187 15.1 UAE population pyramid, 2005 221 15.2 2010 age-specific mortality rates (per 1,000): nationals versus migrants 231 16.1 EMI and inter-survey increase 240 18.1 Percentage distribution of land alienation to total household population 267

Tables

1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 1.5 1.6 4.1 6.1 6.2 6.3 6.4 6.5 6.6 6.7 7.1 8.1 8.2 8.3

KMS estimates on Kerala diaspora Emigrants from Kerala in different countries Out-migrants from Kerala Social media participation Richest Keralites among Forbes 100 richest Indians NORKA in state plan Sample size of organisations and individuals for the study Amount earned from primary job Other benefits from current (primary) job (%) besides money paid for work Number of rest day(s) allowed during the week (%) Most important difficulties faced by migrant workers at workplace (%) Any cases of verbal abuse or physical abuse experienced or were aware of with employment (%) Percentage of respondents who reported being ‘very satisfied’ or ‘somewhat satisfied’ with allowances in their lives Topics or issues to be covered if an organization were to conduct an informational or an educational programme about foreign workers in (this country) (%) Age restrictions by some countries on female migration for work A socio-demographic profile of Indian migrants in Doha, means (standard deviation) Before migration: labour market characteristics and contract conditions, mean (standard deviation) After migration: labour market characteristics and contract conditions, mean (standard deviation)

7 8 9 14 14 19 51 78 79 81 81 83 84 86 93 108 110 112

Tables xiii   8.4 Questionable practices: differences in means 113   9.1 Monthly income of Tamil migrants by age in Dubai 128   9.2 Influence of working environment among Tamil migrants129 10.1 Major welfare funds in some of the Colombo Process countries135 10.2 Prominent activities using the ICWF 140 10.3 Funds spent country-wise, out of the indian community welfare fund (ICWF) for carrying out welfare activities for overseas indian citizens 140 11.1 Number of Indian nationals in Kuwait according to visa status, 31 December 2012 147 11.2 Characteristics of second-generation high school Indian students by gender 149 11.3 Characteristics of fathers of Indian students 151 11.4 Characteristics of mothers of Indian students 154 11.5 Future aspirations and general perceptions of secondgeneration high school Indian students by gender 156 11.6 Things liked best in Kuwait by second-generation Indian students by gender 159 11.7 Things disliked most in Kuwait by second-generation Indian students by gender 160 12.1 Number of emigration clearances granted, 2011–15 163 12.2 Number of work status corrections in Saudi Arabia during the amnesty 2013 164 12.3 Percentage of Kerala emigrants who travelled to the Gulf without valid employment visa, 2006–11 166 12.4 Irregular migrants in the Gulf, 2015 167 12.5 Irregular migrants in the Gulf as a percentage of GCC labour force and total population 168 12.6 Preliminary figures of Indian workers arrested for residency law and visa violations and deported by Saudi authorities, for whom the Indian Consulate issued emergency certificates, 2011–13 174 15.1 Available population estimates, United Arab Emirates 2010 226 15.2 Estimated 2010 UAE population structure 229 15.3 Projected 2010 United Arab Emirates migrant population based on Abu Dhabi 2011 Census data 230 16.1 Emigrants and inter-survey change 239 16.2 Emigrants by districts of Kerala, 1998–2014 240 16.3 Emigrants by religion, 1998–2014 242

xiv  Tables 16.4 Percentage of households with one or more migrants by religion, 2008–14 16.5 Country of residence of emigrants, 1998–2011 16.6 Percentage of emigrants in the age group 20–40 at the time of emigration 16.7 Proportion of emigrants and general population with secondary level of education 16.8 Total remittances by religion, 1998–2014 16.9 Macro-economic impact of remittances on Kerala economy, 1998–2014 18.1 Distribution of land size owned by communities (area in acres) 18.2 Distribution of land ownership by social groups 18.3 Distribution of land owned by communities (area in acres) 18.4 Distribution of land by social groups 18.5 Logistic estimates of the likelihood of landownership 18.6 Likelihood ratio tests 18.7 Logistic estimates of the likelihood of the incident of conflict event 18.8 Likelihood ratio test 19.1 Distribution of job card-issued households across the districts according to social groups during the 2009–10 financial year 19.2 Distribution of working households across the districts by their castes during the 2009–10 financial year 19.3 Distribution of working households among registered households across the districts according to social groups during the 2009–10 financial year 19.4 Distribution of registered and working SHG and disabled households across the districts during the 2009–10 financial year 19.5 Distribution of household worked days according to social groups across the districts during 2009–10 financial year 19.6 Classification of households according to number of completed work days across the districts during the 2009–10 financial year 19.7 Classification of number of registered persons and wage seekers by their sex across the districts during the 2009–10 financial year

242 244 245 247 250 251 266 266 268 268 275 276 278 278 284 285 287 288 289 290 292

Tables xv 19.8

Classification of number of estimated person days and person days completed across the districts during the 2009–10 financial year 293 19.9 Proportion of MGNREGA status of works across the districts during the 2009–10 financial year 295 19.10 Distribution of person days under different work categories across the districts during the 2009–10 financial year 296 20.1 Selected indicators of Kerala (migrants’ destination state) and West Bengal (migrants’ origin state) 301 20.2 Migrants’ socio-economic and demographic characteristics304 20.3 Naming of components 306 20.4 Total variance explained 306 20.5 Rotated component matrix 307

Preface

I am pleased to introduce the seventh annual India Migration Report series (IMRs) which focuses on the problems, benefits and challenges facing Indian migrants in the Gulf, with their demographic, social, economic, gender and political perspectives. Over the past six years (2010–15), the IMRs have documented macro and micro case studies, reports and views and perspectives of diverse scholars from different disciplines on specific themes, including those of policy makers and activists. The first volume in this series, India Migration Report (IMR) 2010, critically examined areas such as governance and migration, linkages between migration trends and policy measures, the history of Indian emigration and mapping of skilled and unskilled labour flows. There was special focus on remittances and the impact of workers’ remittances on consumption, investment and growth. The second volume in this series, IMR 2011, discussed the implications of internal migration. It reviewed the question of migrant identity, the conflicts and problems faced by the internal migrants and their livelihood strategies. The report also looked into recruitment processes and matters related to the protection of the rights of migrant workers within India. It also featured a district-level analysis of the various facets of migration with special emphasis on employment networks and migration development linkages. The third volume, IMR 2012, dealt with the global financial crisis and its impact on emigration, return migration and remittances. It focused on topics such as return migration, remittances and migrant reintegration, in the context of both the countries of origin and destination. This report brought out India’s significance as a labour-rich country and linked it to the global economic scenario. The fourth volume in the series, IMR 2013, covered the social and human costs of migration, a topic neglected in research on global

Preface xvii migration. It documented the impact of migration on those left behind in the place of origin – women, children and the elderly. It also addressed the social costs incurred by migrants at the destination, such as the psychological impact of the culture shock they experience. The fifth volume in the series, IMR 2014, assessed the role of diaspora in improving and sustaining economic development in the countries of origin and destination. This area is understudied and deserves more attention in order to understand the economic as well as the psychological and social impact that migrants have on the countries of origin and destination. The sixth volume in the series, IMR 2015, focused on the topic of migration and gender. It dealt with issues related to gender-based immigration visa, problems faced by domestic workers in the destination, vulnerability related to international marriage migration and the characteristics of female migration in urban India. It also highlighted the plight of undocumented migrants, a topic rarely discussed within migration research. The seventh volume, IMR 2016, is organised into 20 chapters. The first two chapters examine theoretical issues related to Gulf migration and beyond. K.N. Harilal and C.S. Akhil examine the deterritorialisation of Kerala with the Gulf in terms of economy, society and polity, whereas Shareena Banu discusses the resettlement of Indian transnational labour migrant families in the Gulf and raises questions related to neoliberal subjectivity and oikonomia. Based on his experience of working in Qatar, Ray Jureidini argues for systematic labour reforms in recruitment practices and advocates ethical recruitment both in the countries of origin and destination for the welfare of migrants. According to our recent estimates, the Gulf countries account for 9 million Indian emigrants. My study, coauthored with Arya Suresh, discusses the role of the labour attachés, who are part of the Indian Embassy in alleviating labour-related issues in the Gulf. We conducted fieldwork among Indian workers and other welfare organisations, key informant interviews and discussions with the Indian Embassy officials in the United Arab Emirates and Qatar, and our findings are reported in Chapter 4. George S. Naufal, Froilan T. Malit Jr and Ismail H. Genc examine contemporary labour migration in the Gulf in the broader context and report related challenges and opportunities. The Social and Economic Survey Institute of Qatar University undertakes large-scale migration surveys among migrant workers in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries similar to the migration surveys undertaken by the Centre for Development Studies since 1998 in Kerala, Goa and Tamil

xviii  Preface Nadu. Abdoulaye Diop, Kien Trung Le and Michael C. Ewers report on the findings of one of these surveys conducted in the GCC and examine the living and working conditions of Indian migrant workers. Radhika Kanchana has been undertaking fieldwork among female migrants over the past four years in almost all the Gulf countries. She argues that India’s migration policies have increased the vulnerability of female migrants in the India-Gulf migration corridor. The Centre for Development Studies and Georgetown University in Qatar conducted a joint field survey among Indian workers in Qatar. Based on the large-scale survey, Arjun S. Bedi, S. Irudaya Rajan and Ganesh Seshan provide a snapshot of the experience of Indian labour migrants in Qatar. In the next chapter, Chitra Ranganathan reports her doctoral work based on fieldwork conducted among Tamil migrants in the United Arab Emirates. T.L.S. Bhaskar reports on one of the initiatives of the erstwhile Ministry of Overseas Indian Affairs called the Indian Community Welfare Fund and the important role it plays in protecting migrant workers in destination countries, especially in the Gulf, the destination of most of the country’s unskilled migrant labour. Indian migration to the Gulf probably spans about five decades, and the second generation of Indians were born in the Gulf countries. Nasra M. Shah profiles the second-generation Indian high school students in Kuwait based on an extensive field study conducted in Kuwait. With continuing our research interest in Indian migration to Saudi Arabia, one of the largest Gulf countries hosting Indian emigrants, S. Irudaya Rajan and Jolin Joseph present an estimate of undocumented Indian emigrants in the Gulf based on Amnesty International data as well as our long-term fieldwork in Kerala. Mary E. Breeding discusses Indian recruitment agencies in the India-Gulf migration corridor with local perspectives based on her fieldwork. Laavanya Kathiravelu examines Gulf migration beyond the economic lens and discusses its cultural and social impact based on her fieldwork in the United Arab Emirates. Katharine A. Allen also does a demographic analysis of migration-driven population based on her research in the United Arab Emirates. The last five chapters report the ongoing research at the Centre for Development Studies (CDS). K.C. Zachariah and S. Irudaya Rajan report the findings from the sixth Kerala Migration Survey. This survey is based on 15,000 households throughout Kerala. K. Indu and S. Irudaya Rajan briefly report their ongoing project on development displacement migration in Kochi funded by the International Development Research Centre. Over the past two years, two doctoral students

Preface xix who worked on migration at CDS were awarded their PhD by Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. Their work is presented in Chapters 18 and 19. The final chapter reports the recent study conducted on Bengali workers in the construction industry in Kerala. Before signing off, I would like to report on a few happenings around the CDS. As readers may be aware, the Research Unit on International Migration set up by the Ministry of Overseas Indian Affairs (MOIA) completed ten years of its existence in 2016 and it has been officially closed. In addition, MOIA has been merged with the Ministry of External Affairs. We will have to wait and see how the merger will impact the welfare of Indian emigrants. The journal Migration and Development has entered its fifth year and will henceforth have three issues. I had proposed to move from two issues to three issues after five years. With its tremendous success, I am glad to inform you that the journal has already published three issues since 2016, and I hope to move to four issues from the current three issues in another five years. I thank everyone associated for all the support. The first five annual IMRs were published as a multivolume boxed set on 17 September 2014 on the occasion of Dr K.C. Zachariah’s 90th birthday. With feedback from training participants and publishers, ten important papers from among the 88 chapters published in the IMRs during the first five years are being brought out as a volume entitled India Migrations Reader in 2016. Following the tremendous success of the IMRs, I am planning to launch the first South Asia Migration Report in 2017, and we expect to bring out three volumes every two years – in 2017, 2019 and 2021. Finally, IMR 2017 will focus on developed induced displacement migration or forced migration in the context of development, followed by Indian migrants in Europe in 2018. Subsequent IMRs are likely to discuss the subjects of migration and health and also refugees in India.

Acknowledgements

The annual India Migration Reports have received overwhelming acceptance and acclaim from readers including development practitioners, policymakers, researchers and activists. I take this opportunity to thank all the contributors in making each volume in the series a must-read and, in particular, the IMR 2016, a comprehensive collection of important and thought-provoking articles on Gulf migration, focusing on various dimensions such as recruitment, living conditions and undocumented migration to the region. I would like to acknowledge the continued support received from the Ministry of Overseas Indians Affairs (MOIA) through its Research Unit on International Migration (RUIM) since 2006. The RUIM had successfully completed ten years at the time of merger of the MOIA with the Ministry of External Affairs, Government of India. I would like to place on record my appreciation of all the former secretaries of the MOIA, in particular S. Krishna Kumar, K. Mohandas and A. Didar Singh, whose unwavering help was indispensable in running the RUIM over the past ten years. At the CDS, K.M. Chandrasekhar, chairman; Amit Shovon Ray, director; P. Suresh Babu, registrar; V. Sriram, librarian; and S. Suresh, finance officer, as well as my colleagues, administrative and library staff, have encouraged, guided and supported all academic endeavours. Members of my research team, K. Sreeja and Sunitha Shyam, have also put in a lot of effort to bring out this report. I also gratefully cherish the emotional support, patience and understanding provided by my wife, Hema, and our three children – Rahul, Rohit and Mary. Finally, I would like to record my appreciation for the hard work done by the editorial and sales teams of Routledge in bringing out this report on time. S. Irudaya Rajan

Contributors

C.S. Akhil, Doctoral Fellow, Centre for Development Studies, Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala, India. Katharine A. Allen, Assistant Scientist, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Department of International Health, Johns Hopkins University, USA. Shareena Banu C.P., Assistant Professor, Department of Sociology, Jamia Millia Islamia, New Delhi, India. Arjun S. Bedi, Professor of Development Economics, International Institute of Social Studies, Erasmus University Rotterdam, The Hague, The Netherlands. T.L.S. Bhaskar, Chief Administrative Officer, India Centre for Migration of the Ministry of Overseas Indian Affairs, Government of India. Mary E. Breeding, Consultant, World Bank. Rikil Chyrmang, Omeo Kumar Das Institute of Social Change and Development, Guwahati, Assam, India. Bhaswati Das, Associate Professor, Centre for the Study of Regional Development, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, India. Abdoulaye Diop, Associate Research Professor and Head of Research Department, Social and Economic Survey Research Institute (SESRI), Qatar University, Doha, Qatar. Michael C. Ewers, Associate Research Professor and Senior Policy Analyst, SESRI, Qatar University, Doha, Qatar. Ismail H. Genc, Professor of Economics, American University of Sharjah, UAE. K.N. Harilal, Professor, Centre for Development Studies, Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala, India.

xxii  Contributors K. Indu, Post-Doctoral Fellow, Centre for Development Studies, Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala, India. Jolin Joseph, Doctoral Fellow, York Center for Asian Research, York University, Canada. S. Irudaya Rajan, Professor, Centre for Development Studies, Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala, India. Ray Jureidini, Professor, Center for Islamic Legislation and Ethics, Qatar Faculty of Islamic Studies, Hamad Bin Khalifa University, Doha, Qatar. Radhika Kanchana, Doctoral Fellow, French National Council for Scientific Research, Paris, France. Laavanya Kathiravelu, Assistant Professor, Division of Sociology, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. Vijay Korra, Assistant Professor, Centre for Economic and Social Studies (CESS), Hyderabad, India. Kien Trung Le, Associate Research Professor and Senior Researcher, SESRI, Qatar University, Doha, Qatar. Froilan T. Malit Jr, GCC migration policy researcher, American University of Sharjah, UAE. George S. Naufal, Senior Research Associate, Public Policy and Research Institute (PPRI), Texas A&M University, USA and Research Fellow, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA). Chitra Ranganathan, Post-Doctoral Fellow, Indian Council for Social Science Research, Department of Sociology, University of Kerala, India. Md. Selim Reja, Assistant Professor, University B.T. and Evening College, West Bengal, India. Ganesh Seshan, Assistant Professor, School of Foreign Service in Qatar, Georgetown University, Doha, Qatar. Nasra M. Shah, Professor of Demography, Department of Community Medicine and Behavioural Sciences, Faculty of Medicine, Kuwait University, Kuwait. Arya Suresh, Researcher, Centre for Development Studies, Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala, India. K.C. Zachariah, Honorary Professor, Centre for Development Studies, Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala, India.

1 Deterritorialisation of Keralam Economy, society and polity K.N. Harilal and C.S. Akhil

With the head placed on the green quilt covering Sahyan And the feet rested on the beaches of the calm sea As you lay down, oh Mother, both your sides are guarded by Kumari and Gokarnesan Malayalam poem ‘Mathruvandanam’

The lines of renowned Malayalam poet Vallathol Narayana Menon reproduced here represent an attempt to imagine Keralam territorially. It is not difficult to identify more such texts that endeavoured to do the same at different stages of the history of the region. The Keralolpathy legend perhaps is the best known among them, according to which the land known as Keralam was recovered from the seas by Lord Parasurama by throwing his axe from Gokarnam (belonging to the state of Karnataka now) to Kanyakumari (in Tamil Nadu at present). The geographical boundaries of the present Kerala State were defined in 1956, when states in India were reorganised, and united Keralam formed. The political boundaries of the state do not correspond well with the imagined Keralams or with the distribution of Malayalam-speaking people. The main disjuncture is Kanyakumari district of Tamil Nadu, which was part of the erstwhile Travancore, with a sizeable number of Malayalam-speaking people. It is doubtful whether political borders ever matched the imagined territory of Keralam. Yet the idea of Keralam is quite old, at least as old as the Mahabali fable. Obviously, the idea of Keralam always had an element that went beyond political boundaries. Territory was and continues to be problematic in understanding Keralam. A view of Keralam confined to the geographical boundaries of Kerala State is grossly inadequate. Global disbursal of Keralites in the aftermath of the formation of united Keralam in 1956, especially

2  K.N. Harilal and C.S. Akhil since the 1970s when migration to the Middle East picked momentum, has transformed Keralam into an archetypical deterritorialised society. There is a large mass of Keralites living beyond its territory, in rest of India and abroad. Keralam is located and lives both within and outside the state. Even though migration from Kerala has of late attracted a lot of attention, underlying deterritorialisation of Keralam is not yet widely discussed or understood. This chapter attempts to fill in this void. Globalisation is making people much more mobile than in the past across territories and nations. But disbursal of people belonging to a nation or a territory across wider geographies is not something new. Diasporas of the past and present are not the same; they differ a lot in many ways. Compared to the past, contemporary migratory movements are much more voluntary and free at least in the formal sense. Earlier diaspora was far removed in distance and connectivity from home, whereas now, because of technology, distances have narrowed and real-time and simultaneous participation in life at home and host regions has become a possibility. Life for many people is becoming transnational and multi-local. Obviously, therefore, territory is losing importance in the life and times of deterritorialised societies. A deterritorialised society produces and reproduces its common culture both within and off the territory and together. Nonetheless, what is to be highlighted here is the intransigence of the polity; polity remains stubbornly territory centric even in highly deterritorialised societies. In the design and functioning of polity, those at home are privileged over those off home. What we see is ‘home rule’ of both home and off home! The territory-centric nature of the polity is reflected even in the case of the making of the diaspora policy. Until recently, the diaspora policy in most cases was made and implemented by home. This is not to overlook recent efforts made almost everywhere to involve diaspora in diaspora policy. But what about the larger question of the polity in general? What about the participation of people off the territory in the governance of the processes shaping the common future of deterritorialised societies? The question may sound too futuristic, but not when raised in the context of societies that are moving onto advanced stages of deterritorialisation, such as Keralam. The process of deterritorialisation is quite advanced in Keralam, not only because of the big size of the diaspora or its contribution to the economy but also because of its role in producing and reproducing the society and culture. A Keralite inside the territory cannot claim any superiority over a Keralite off the territory in building Keralam in its various dimensions. Diaspora

Deterritorialisation of Keralam 3 participation in the production of literature, music, cinema, festivals, media, charity, corruption, scams, scandals, religion, communal and community activities, politics is in no way inferior to those at home. It is also fast acquiring features such as contemporaneity and synchronicity. Still the rein of home Keralam over off Keralam continues unabated. However, in our view, change in polity cannot wait for long. This chapter is divided into four sections. In the first section, we introduce some concepts, and certain possible ways in which they are interrelated, that are useful in understanding deterritorialised societies. In the second section, we present a picture of the Kerala diaspora focusing on geography and composition. In the third section, we take up an analysis of the role of diaspora in building Keralam in terms of selected important dimensions. The fourth section is devoted to a discussion of the polity to underline the need for as well as possible modes of change.

Concepts and connections It is global disbursal of Keralites that prompts us to think about deterritorialisation of Keralam. Certainly, augmented flow of people across territories is one of the central reasons for the origin of the idea of deterritorialisation. But, as a perusal of the literature shows, it has wider connotations. Flows of capital, labour, technology, knowledge and so on across boundaries challenge existing territories and push for reterritorialisation (Appadurai, 1990; Tsagarousianou, 2004). Viewed in a broad sense, deterritorialisation and reterritorialisation processes are spatial manifestations of contemporary changes in the relationship between social life and its territorial moorings.1 Territory and territoriality are fundamental for any system of organisation of social relations. Globalisation is leading to major changes in territorial organisation of social life. Such reorganisation is inevitable because social relations are becoming less confined to given political boundaries. Defined generally, ‘territory’ refers to a portion of space that is claimed or occupied by a person or a social group or an institution (Storey, 2001; Passi, 2003). The definition of territory as a portion of space implies the existence of boundaries; a territory is a bounded space (Storey, 2001). Territoriality is the process in which individuals or groups lay claim on territory. It is a spatial strategy to affect, influence and control resources and people by controlling area (Sack, 1986: 1). Territory therefore is socially created. Territory and territoriality bring together ideas of power and space. Power is required to influence and control social relations within the territory.

4  K.N. Harilal and C.S. Akhil Political power, particularly in modern nation-states, is organised territorially in bounded portions of space. Sovereignty of nation-states is an expression of such concentrated power over the territory. With the emergence of nation-states political organisation of the world became nation-state centric. The whole world, except regions such as Antarctica, is divided into nation-states. The interstate system is composed of nation-states, with clearly demarcated territories bounded within rigidly defined and guarded borders. As many theorists have observed, the boundaries were not so rigid before the advent of the modern nation-states (Popescu, 2006). They interpenetrated and were much more porous. The ebbs and flows of social relations were not compressed into the ‘container’ of the nation-state. But the nation-states and the interstate system evolved into an arrangement that demanded confinement of social relations within the bounded territory of the nation-state. Hence, boundaries became far more rigid than in the past. Nation-states are vested with the power to monitor, ban, control and regulate flows – of goods, services, capital, labour, images, ideas and so on – across borders and to govern almost everything that happens within the national territory. It is this nationstate-centric territorial organisation of political power that is being challenged now because of the growth of flows across national boundaries. The nation-state container of social relations is spilling out and leaking all over. As we shall see subsequently, the same problem of worsening mismatch between spatial organisation of political power and the spatiality of a lot of other aspects of social relations can be conceptualised also at the sub-national/provincial level. Although all flows are important for a discussion on deterritorialisation, the focus of this chapter is on the mobility of people. The nature of migratory flows has changed a lot in recent times, on account of globalisation and changes in technology, which has a bearing on the processes of deterritorialisation. The main point we wish to highlight is the full-fledged participation of the diaspora in everyday life at home. The diaspora are not inhibited anymore by physical distance in being a part of social relations among people back home and off home. In fact, diaspora can be seen to act as a medium for many other flows such as those of goods, services, capital, ideas, knowledge and images over the political frontiers (Appadurai, 1990; Clifford, 1997). It is realistic therefore to expect that social relations of a state with a sizeable diaspora would tend to spread over boundaries and get deterritorialised. The literature on diaspora is well informed of the changes in the nature of diasporic behaviour. The shift of focus from ‘migration’ to ‘diaspora’ in itself is an indication of the broadening concerns. Further,

Deterritorialisation of Keralam 5 there are efforts to overhaul and adapt the conceptual framework of diaspora studies to the changing nature of diasporic behaviour. Earlier attempts to define diaspora were essentially static and based on narrow typologies and checklists that highlighted features such as ‘uprooting’, ‘displacement’ and ‘migrancy’ (Cohen, 1997). Narratives of involuntary displacement, life as refugees, marginalisation in host countries, pains of displacement and isolation, nostalgic memories of homeland, vision of eventual return and so on dominated the literature. But besides these familiar themes, recent literature emphasises centrality of communication, connectivity, transnationality, voluntariness of migrants’ decisions and temporariness of migratory movements.2 In short, heterogeneity of diasporic behaviour is underlined. In understanding diaspora, the question of how Diaspora perceive themselves is important. They should be able to collectively imagine themselves as a diaspora. Studies also highlight participation of diaspora in the making of the common culture of the larger society to which they belong. On account of wider exposure, brain gain, command over capital, access to wider networks and so on, diaspora can also be quite forward looking and influence discourses back home. The influence of diaspora media should also be mentioned here, which makes ‘simultaneous existence at different places’ possible. Technology and its use in diasporic media are making ‘coexistence’ and ‘experiencing together’ possible (Tsagarousianou, 2004). ‘The temporal convergence (made possible by transnational diasporic media) brings a qualitative change in the experience of migrancy and the dynamics set in motion by it: whereas earlier forms of socio-political distanciation were inextricably linked with temporal distance, making it very difficult for disbursed migrants to share experiences and form common frames of making sense of these, the sense of contemporaneity and synchronicity made possible by diasporic media in late modernity enables new ways of “co-existence and experiencing together” ’ (Tsagarousianou, 2004). The coexistence and experiencing together happens among those who are within and away from the homeland. What are the implications of growing disjuncture between a given territory of people and the spatiality of their social life? Social life, as we gather from the foregoing discussion, is becoming multi-scalar. The local, regional, sub-national, national and international flows mix together in contemporary social life. The disjuncture between different aspects of social life and their scalar dynamics is critical in the case of the dichotomy between political organisation and other aspects of social life which are getting deterritorialised. It is here the need for and the possibility of alternative political arrangements emerges.

6  K.N. Harilal and C.S. Akhil The emergence of supranational institutions such as the World Trade Organisation (WTO) and various regional economic arrangements represents a kind of apportionment of sovereignty to negotiate deterritorialised flows. ‘It is also possible to think of political space in functional than territorial terms wherein different regulation regimes regulate a specific field of activity across national territory’ (Popescu, 2006). For instance, it is possible to have an interstate regime to govern international movement of people. A more important dimension of a possible rearrangement of political regime is related to the role and participation of the diaspora in the political organisation of the homeland. If they are co-producers of the common culture, and if they are participating in every important event of social life, almost on a real-time basis, why should they be denied the right of political participation? Why should the home be privileged over people off home? There are different approaches for facilitating such political participation of the diaspora. Extending voting rights to the diaspora in the capacity as diaspora would amount to extending jurisdiction of sovereign power to them, with attendant rights and obligations. The literature on diaspora policy takes note of such efforts by the nation-states to extend sovereignty beyond the limits of home territory (Gamlen, 2006).

Geography of Kerala diaspora An important limitation of diaspora studies is poor database, which is true of most developing nations including India. It is hard to get reliable numbers, not to speak of pertinent qualitative information. Kerala is not an exception to the general rule. Nonetheless, database is relatively better in the case of Kerala, thanks to the Kerala Migration Surveys (KMS Rounds 1998, 2003, 2008, 2011 and 2014) conducted by the Centre for Development Studies (Zachariah and Irudaya Rajan, 2015). Another important source is the ‘Pravasi Malayali Census’ carried out by the Department of Economics and Statistics, Government of Kerala.3 However, we rely mainly on KMS for it is the only source that allows temporal comparison. The results of KMS are widely disseminated, by virtue of several reports and studies, so that a detailed discussion would be repetitive.4 We would therefore confine to certain important facets that are of value to the main arguments we desire to drive home in the chapter. The main idea is to show how Keralam has grown out and spread far beyond its territorial boundaries. It is important to note a distinction that the KMS makes between emigrants and out-migrants. Emigrants are members of households in

Deterritorialisation of Keralam 7 Kerala living outside India. Out-migrants are Kerala migrants living in other states in India. KMS gives data on emigrants, return emigrants, out-migrants and return out-migrants. The four categories taken together give a fairly comprehensive view of all the relevant flows. Needless to say that from the point of view of Kerala State, Keralites living in other parts of India should also count as diaspora. Here we would suggest a major improvement in the definition of Kerala diaspora to include Malayalam-speaking people in Kanyakumari district. They share almost all important features used in the literature to define diaspora. Until the 1930s Kerala was a net in-migrating region. Even though there were some important streams of emigration prior to the formation of Kerala State, the number of people involved was much less compared to the contemporary flows. Until the 1970s outflow of Keralites was mainly to other states in India. It was the oil boom in the Middle East since the early 1970s that made the big difference. From then onwards until now, the number of emigrants has been growing, although the rate of growth differed between KMS Rounds.5 The data presented in Table 1.1 gives the relevant aggregates. Migration to rest of India has also been quite substantial in terms of numbers, but the pattern of change over time was much more erratic than the emigration flows. What we wish to highlight is the overwhelming importance of the diaspora for Kerala society, even if we confine to the number of people involved. According to the 2014 Round, for

Table 1.1  KMS estimates on Kerala diaspora Kerala Migration Survey year

1998

2008

2011

2014

Number of emigrants from Kerala Number of return emigrants Number of non-resident Keralites Number of out-migrants from Kerala Number of return outmigrants Number of interstate migrants

1,361,919

2,193,412

2,280,543

2,400,375

739,245

1,157,127

1,150,347

1,252,471

2,101,164

3,350,538

3,430,889

3,652,845

691,695

914,387

930,724

700,342

958,826

686,198

510,658

389,890

1,650,521

1,600,585

1,441,382

1,090,232

Source: Various rounds of Kerala Migration Survey.

8  K.N. Harilal and C.S. Akhil every 100 households in Kerala, there are around 44.6 people having direct diaspora experience (Zachariah and Irudaya Rajan, 2015). Obviously, it would be wrong to consider diaspora as a residual or marginal phenomenon. There is hardly anything more central to the Kerala economy than the diaspora. The number of people having diaspora experience is bigger than those earning a livelihood from agriculture, industry or any individual sub-sectors of the services sector. Tables 1.2 and 1.3 give an idea of the diaspora-led deterritorialisation of Keralam. As Table 1.2 shows, West Asia and the countries of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) account for most of the emigrants. According to the latest KMS Round, 86.3 per cent of the emigrants are in the West Asian region. As a comparison with the previous rounds shows, the dominance

Table 1.2  Emigrants from Kerala in different countries Countries

United Arab Emirates Saudi Arabia Oman Kuwait Bahrain Qatar Other West Asian countries Subtotal United States Canada United Kingdom Other European countries Africa Singapore Maldives Malaysia Other South East Asian countries Australia/New Zealand Other countries Total

Number of emigrants from Kerala in different countries

Percentage of emigrants out of total emigrant population

883,313 574,739 195,300 127,782 101,556 148,428 6,696

38.7 25.2 8.6 5.6 4.5 6.5 0.3

2,037,813 68,076 9,486 44,640 10,602

89.4 3 0.4 2 0.5

12,834 11,160 7,254 13,392 16,182

0.6 0.5 0.3 0.6 0.7

24,552 24,552 2,280,543

1.1 1.1 100

Source: Calculations based on Kerala Migration Survey Report, 2011.

Deterritorialisation of Keralam 9 Table 1.3  Out-migrants from Kerala States

Out-migrants from Percentage of outKerala migrants out of total outmigrant population

Karnataka 268,723 Tamil Nadu 238,511 Maharashtra 178,618 New Delhi 68,903 Andhra Pradesh 45,052 Gujarat 36,042 Uttar Pradesh 9,540 Jammu and Kashmir 6,360 Madhya Pradesh 10,070 West Bengal 7,420 Bihar 2,650 Chhattisgarh 3,180 Punjab 10,601 Andaman and Nicobar 530 Rajasthan 6,360 Malayalam-speaking people 150,000 in Kanyakumari district Others 38,163 Total 1,080,723

24.9 22.1 16.5 6.4 4.2 3.3 0.9 0.6 0.9 0.7 0.2 0.3 1.0 0.0 0.6 13.9 3.5 100.0

Source: Calculations based on Kerala Migration Report, 2011. Note: The definition of out-migrants as used in KMS does not include Malayalamspeaking population in Kanyakumari. The census does not provide the number of Malayalam-speaking people in Kanyakumari district. The data used here is taken from http://www.spc.tn.gov.in/reports/Kanniyakumari.pdf.

of West Asia is declining over the years. Notably, among developed country destinations Australia, New Zealand and Canada are gaining importance in a fairly sustained manner. The studies also note a process of transformation in the skill and educational composition of the emigrants (Zachariah and Irudaya Rajan, 2012).6 The growing proportion of skilled workers and persons of higher educational attainments suggests voluntary and forward-looking nature of Kerala diaspora. The presence of professionals and entrepreneurs, who own small, medium and large businesses abroad, is also indicative of a shift in the composition, once dominated by desperate unskilled workers, to a more diversified diaspora. As mentioned, the global policy regime is shifting in favour of temporary movement of natural persons. Interestingly, temporariness is

10  K.N. Harilal and C.S. Akhil the hallmark of emigration from Kerala. The probability of Kerala diaspora settling in host countries is low, mainly because of the policy of leading host countries. Countries in the Middle East are very rigid in giving citizenship to the immigrants. In Western developed nations, especially the United States and the European countries, the barriers to citizenship have been increasing over time. The composition of emigrants is greatly influenced by the import demand on the one hand and policy on the other. The demand structure in West Asian countries is moving in favour of skilled and professional workers. In the United States and the OECD countries in general, the migration policy is heavily biased in favour of highly skilled workers, intra-corporate transferees and people with high educational attainments (Karayil, 2015). The supply-side factors also influence the diasporic behaviour. Kerala appears to have been successful in adapting to changes in the receiving regions by improving the infrastructure facilities in education, training, communication, transportation and financial services. There is also the pressure of competition from poorer regions of the world for low-end jobs. The supply price and job expectations are higher in the case of Keralites compared to the competing sending regions. The change in the diasporic behaviour is reflected in certain other dimensions of its composition as well. As shown in Table 1.1, the proportion of Keralites working in other states to the emigrants has been on the decline. Obviously, those who move out of Kerala prefer foreign destinations. Further, among destinations abroad, as the domination of West Asia and OECD countries show, Keralites have a preference for countries with higher per capita income and development. Table 1.3 is indicative of the spread of Kerala migrants within India. The pattern appears to confirm the gravity models where distance plays a major role in determining the spread. There is an obvious concentration in the southern states neighbouring Kerala. The nerve centre of the process of concentration is Karnataka State. From 12.9 per cent in 1998 the share of Karnataka increased to 33.1 per cent in 2014 (Zachariah and Irudaya Rajan, 2015). An important reason is the Bangalore-centred IT boom. The proportions reported here on the basis of KMS do not include Kerala diaspora residing in Kanyakumari district. But their importance is conspicuous in Table 1.3.7 The argument of deterritorialisation of Keralam is further strengthened by the in-migration of workers from rest of the country, especially eastern India, to Kerala. Capital and labour are becoming more mobile across the Indian states. Kerala is attracting workers from other states mainly to meet the shortage of workers in jobs that

Deterritorialisation of Keralam 11 demand manual labour. According to an estimate in 2013, there were around 2.5 million migrant workers in the state (Narayana and Venkiteswaran, 2013).

Keralam made in and off Kerala In this section, we take some important avenues of social life to illustrate how life within and beyond the borders are closely interwoven and how people at and off home produce the common culture together and concurrently. What we see is conspicuous deterritorialisation of almost all aspects of social life of Keralam. The deterritorialisation of life in Keralam is led by the diaspora. But social sciences as practised in the region are not yet free from the nation-state-centric and ‘closed’ territory approach. This is reflected even in understanding a phenomenon like diaspora, which transcends territory. Whatever diaspora does is treated as an addition to what happens at home, not as a part of an analytical whole. We are caught in an accountancy syndrome. In fact, what happens inside and outside or what Keralites do within and outside the state is so intertwined that they are almost inseparable. The idea of inseparability has important analytical implications. The role of the diaspora or its impact on different avenues of social life cannot be seen as an addendum. The diaspora should be built into the framework of analysis so that structural connections are taken care of. Let us start with the migration development nexus. One debilitating feature of the existing literature on the state’s development experience is the ‘closed economy’ approach (Harilal and Joseph, 2000). One important reason for this is the micro-economic bias of the literature (Nayyar, 1994: 3–5). The issues involved are seen mainly from the point of view of the migrant workers or their families. Therefore, questions relating to the decision to migrate, profile of the migrants, immigration rules and working conditions, income earned and saved, remittances, utilisation of remittances, return migration, rehabilitation and so on dominate the literature (Prakash, 1998; Nair, 1999; Zachariah et al., 1999; Pani and Jafar, 2010). Even though these studies provide valuable insights, micro-effects cannot be easily aggregated when there is divergence between private and social benefits or costs. For instance, migration involving brain drain may be beneficial for the individuals involved but not to the economy as a whole. The scenario can be just the reverse in the case of brain gain. Another reason is the partial equilibrium framework adopted by the studies on migration. The migration-remittances phenomenon is discussed, but as something ‘structurally external’. Accordingly, migration is recognised to affect

12  K.N. Harilal and C.S. Akhil the income of the people, not so much by influencing domestic production but by way of remittances.8 It is important to break the existing tradition by bringing in the question of migration and remittances to its rightful place within the structure of the regional economy. This is exactly what the studies that use the insights of the Dutch disease economics have done (Balakrishnan, 1999; Harilal and Joseph, 2000). What the studies based on Dutch disease economics prove is the possibility of migration-remittances boom adversely impacting domestic production in goods-producing sectors. The Dutch disease syndrome is explained in terms of two symptomatic effects, namely ‘resource movement effect’ and ‘spending effect’ (Corden and Peter, 1982; Fardmanesh, 1991). The expansion of the booming sector would draw the mobile factor out of other sectors and bid up its price (in the Kerala context, migration boom bids up wages). The resulting contraction of the nonbooming tradable sectors due to heightened competition for factors of production is referred to as the ‘resource movement effect.’ The spending of the extra income from the export boom would tend to bid up the prices of non-tradable goods vis-à-vis tradable goods, leading to a real appreciation and erosion of competitiveness of the tradable sector. The ‘spending effect’ refers to the contraction of the non-booming tradable sectors on account of the real appreciation. The Dutch disease environment described here has had definite adverse effect on the goodsproducing sectors of the state’s economy, especially agriculture. It also explains the disproportionately higher growth of the services sector. The Kerala economy is still under the influence of the Dutch disease. It is keeping the wages of workers doing manual labour high compared to competitors. Same is the case of the prices of non-tradable goods and services. It is clear from the high wages and the spiralling of land prices and the sustained boom of the real estate sector (Harilal and Eswaran, 2015). It is not to say the goods-producing sectors are doomed to fail in Kerala. The message is clear: only those lines of economic activities or entrepreneurs, who are immune to Dutch disease conditions, can survive and grow. The non-tradable goods and services, which are not exposed to external competition, are probable candidates of such progress. Same is the case of products, which are tradable but do not depend much on the expensive factors of production or costly nontradable inputs. The growth of construction, real estate, tourism, financial services, information technology-based services and so on is proof for the structural bias under the influence of Dutch disease. Our aim here is not to make an exhaustive study of the effects of the migration-remittances boom on the economy of Kerala. Instead, what we wanted and tried to show was as to how diaspora influences

Deterritorialisation of Keralam 13 domestic production in fundamental ways. Estimating what diaspora does in different walks of life is important in itself. But such partial estimates by itself will not add up to the aggregate effect. This is because diaspora is not a marginal phenomenon anymore. For instance, remittances to Kerala come around 36 per cent of the state domestic product (Zachariah and Irudaya Rajan, 2015). In the sphere of economy we have seen how diaspora influences parameters of domestic economic activities. This is more or less true of many other aspects of life, such as literature, theatre, cinema, music, religion, caste, politics, media, education and health. The influence of diaspora in the production of literature cannot be gauged by studying diaspora literature. The diaspora influence could be seen even in the creations of people who have not had any direct diasporic experience. In short, Keralam lives both within and outside the territorial boundaries of the state. The culture of Keralam is produced within and outside the state. Almost everything related to life of Keralites, such as birth, death, marriages, worship and education, happens at home as well as away from the home territory. More important, life at home and away influences each other intensely and almost concurrently. Here we wish to emphasise contemporaneity and synchronicity of such interactions between people at home and the diaspora. They are made possible by diasporic media that use technology to overcome time and distance and make real-time participation possible. Diaspora participates in family events and discussions using technology and frequent visits. Keralites’ presence is prominent in the public sphere of Keralam, which has also transcended the conventional territorial limits. The public sphere has become transnational. The global Keralites meet on the Internet. The diaspora is very active in the discussions organised by newspapers, television channels, Internet forums, social media and so on. Distance is fast disappearing as a deterrent to participation. In Table 1.4 we present an innovative and convincing piece of evidence to prove the contemporaneity of diaspora participation in the making of social life back home. It shows the percentage of non-resident Keralites (NRKs) who participate actively in social media discussions, especially on the Facebook pages of most followed politicians from Kerala. We have considered the discussions happening on the Facebook pages of six popular (most followed) politicians in the state. We considered the discussions below their posts during the period 1 to 15 October 2015. Among the people who comment under the Facebook posts of these politicians, 48.4 per cent are NRKs. Another important dimension of diaspora participation is related to the changes in the nature of the diaspora itself. Kerala diaspora now

14  K.N. Harilal and C.S. Akhil Table 1.4  Social media participation9 Politicians

Oommen Chandy Ramesh Chennithala Thomas Isaac Pinarayi Vijayan V.T. Balram M.B. Rajesh Total

Number of followers/ likes

Total number of people commented for the status

Total number of NRKs commented for the status

Percentage of NRKs commented for the status

838,542

990

618

62.5

370,596

1,275

601

47.1

254,691 170,440

140 1,298

91 623

65 47.9

137,945 99,183 1,871,397

1,410 378 5,491

543 181 2,657

38.5 47.9 48.4

Source: www.facebook.com.

Table 1.5  Richest Keralites among Forbes 100 richest Indians Serial number

Name

Net worth (US$ billion)

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6.

M.A. Yousuff Ali Ravi Pillai Sunny Varkey Senapathy Gopalakrishnan Azad Moopen P.N.C. Menon

3.7 2.4 2.1 1.7 1.5 1.2

Source: http://www.forbes.com.

includes workers, professionals, intellectuals, entrepreneurs and leaders of big corporate companies. The emergence of diaspora capital, and external direct investment by business houses in Kerala, gives an advantage to the diaspora in the political economy of cultural production. Data presented in Table 1.5 is self-explanatory in bringing out the growth of diaspora capital. Keralites figuring among the top 100 richest Indians listed here are all NRKs. Diaspora capital has a significant presence in the relevant industries such as media, cinema and education. Earlier the diaspora used to look backward to the home for guidance, protection and all sorts of handholding. Even now the majority are in need of such support from home. But an important segment is perhaps much more forward looking than those at home, or at least imagines so, and puts forward their own vision for future

Deterritorialisation of Keralam 15 Keralam. Many of them are also ready to contribute to the cause of building a new Keralam.

Towards an inclusive polity As noted at the outset, and as our discussions in the previous sections clearly suggest, the need to reorient the polity to meet the demands of deterritorialisation of social life is not a futuristic question for Kerala, because the region is in the forefront of the global processes of deterritorialisation. In fact, what Kerala does to meet the challenge will be a useful lesson for other regions which experience or are likely to experience the same predicament of growing mismatch between territorial moorings of social life and the political regime. Polity generally is obstinate in adapting its structure to the changing times. But if proliferation and restructuring of supranational arrangements is an indication, nation-states are willy-nilly preparing to live with new multi-scalar arrangements of political power. Multilateral, plurilateral and regional agreements among countries represent such efforts to distribute sovereignty. Nation-states certainly are not going to wither so soon. Instead, they are trying to remain the centres of power by redefining their role and rearranging the interstate system. But restructuring of nation-states and the interstate system is uneven across different types of flows across national boundaries. The interstate system perhaps is most adaptable in the case of transnational operations of capital, but least accommodating with respect to the movement of labour across borders. The nation-states refuse to be disciplined by multilateral agreements on immigration policy. Incidentally, although the General Agreement on Trade in Services of the WTO addresses movement of people, its reach is limited to the temporary movement of natural persons. Policy towards emigrants or the diaspora of the sending nations also remains outside the purview of multilateral agreements or disciplining. The nation-states are under pressure to part with sovereignty and join multinational arrangements to facilitate hyper-mobility of capital and its global accumulation. There is no such overwhelming pressure on the nation-states to facilitate immigration or emigration. But there are major gains that prompt nations to allow, promote and govern emigration. It is the objective of maximising gains that prompts formulation of diaspora policy in many countries. But extending governmentality to the diaspora is easier said than done. The diaspora engagement policies are attempts to re(produce) citizen–sovereign relationship with the non-residents. Following Foucault, Gamlen (2006)

16  K.N. Harilal and C.S. Akhil characterises it as an ‘effort at trans-nationalising governmentality – the means by which a population is rendered governable, through the construction, machination, and normalization of a set of governmental apparatuses and knowledges’. On the basis of a comparative study of over 70 countries, Gamlen identifies three elements of diaspora engagement policy: first, capacitybuilding policies aimed at discursively producing a state-centric transnational national society and developing a set of corresponding state institutions; second, extending rights to the non-residents, a role that befits a legitimate sovereign; and third, extracting obligations from the non-residents. Gamlen classifies states according to the nature of diaspora policy into three categories: exploitative states, which extract obligations without extending rights; generous states, which extend rights without extracting obligations; and engaged states, which both extract obligations and extend rights. In this scheme, as we shall argue subsequently, India would fall under the first category, that is exploitative states. But before analysing the Indian diaspora policy it is important to note a critical limitation that diaspora policies share almost everywhere. Diaspora engagement policies transnationalise citizenship by extending rights and obligation to the emigrants. But the existing policies do little to democratise the relationship between the home state and the diaspora. Rights and obligations are decided at home and implemented from home without genuine democratic participation of the diaspora. It is difficult to suggest an optimal solution to the problem of representation. It is something that should evolve in response to the reality of deterritorialisation and transnationalisation. What is important is democratic representation of diaspora as diaspora. Diaspora has unique identity and unique problems to be represented in decisionmaking bodies. But it is not a question of their problems alone. More important is their voice as co-producers of the common culture. As we have argued at length in the previous sections, diaspora has a role and a stake, which is no way inferior to the resident citizens in the making of the common culture. In short, transnationalisation of citizenship will have to be accompanied by transnationalisation of democratic participation. An important condition even to begin experimenting new mechanisms of democratic participation is to get out of the territorial mindset. The power of the state is exercised through a multitude of institutions and instruments. Diaspora participation can be initiated in many such avenues. In order to ensure participation at the aggregate level, diaspora representation can be initiated in the existing legislative bodies. Further, it will not be unrealistic to experiment with

Deterritorialisation of Keralam 17 decision-making bodies with participation that transcend the national boundaries. They may be more ceremonial in the beginning, but smart anticipation of what is going to come. Decision-making bodies that transcend national borders are required to represent the evolving mix of resident and non-resident citizens of nations which are increasingly getting deterritorialised. In the threefold classification of states based on the nature of diaspora engagement policies, India cannot but fit into the category of exploitative states. India is the biggest remittances receiving country in the world. It is difficult to overemphasise the value of remittances, especially for a country like India suffering from scarcity of foreign exchange. Remittances are not only one of the biggest but also the most reliable source of foreign currency. Yet the policies to support the diaspora do not match the support extended to other sources of foreign exchange earnings such as exports of goods and services, foreign direct investment and foreign institutional investment (Harilal, 2006). The entire gamut of economic policies, fiscal, monetary, trade and so on of the country is designed to boost the investor confidence. In contrast, government of India does not even have reliable information on the diaspora, at the level of individuals or as aggregate groups. Absence of information is not an accident. It is a conscious choice of the state to be indifferent and unaccountable. There are similar situations reported from elsewhere in the world where illegal migration happens with connivance of both the sending and receiving nations. Migrants, not accounted and not protected, are a source of cheap labour that can be denied even the minimum benefits statutorily due to the workers. Home country is assured of the remittances flow because migrant workers cannot hold their petty savings for long in the host country. The Indian state is referred to as exploitative not only for not helping the migrant workers in protecting their rights in the host countries but also for perpetrating an environment of poor law enforcement that works to the disadvantage and exploitation of the migrants. Migrant workers are subjected to widespread cheating by recruitment agencies, various other intermediaries, employers in the host country and so on. There are also more organised and legalised cheating such as exorbitant rates charged by airlines operating between India and main receiving countries. Here, we are not ignoring the new policy initiatives such as the convening of diaspora meetings, distribution of awards for the non-resident Indians, overseas visa and provision for foreign currency denominated deposits in banks. But these are generally oriented towards the creamy layer of the diaspora, whom the

18  K.N. Harilal and C.S. Akhil government thinks should be incentivised to bring in capital, entrepreneurship and knowledge. Remittances of workers by all means are much more valuable but automatically flowing without any special effort from the government. Diaspora policy of India has a federal fiscal dimension to it. The state governments are not direct beneficiaries of the foreign exchange advantage of remittances. Nor are they in a position to earn any income in the form of taxes or other charges out of migration or remittances. But the cost of emigration, in terms of expenditure on education, health, infrastructure, rehabilitation of returnees, old age care of returnees and so on, is borne mainly by the state governments. Migration of healthy, educated skilled workers from Kerala cannot be separated from the region’s history of public action and public investment in related areas, the cost of which was borne at the provincial level. Expenditure is made at the regional scale, while the benefits get spilled over to the national scale. Despite the constraint of the fiscal space, the state government in Kerala had initiated certain pioneering diaspora policy initiatives. It is the first state in the country to start an independent department for diaspora welfare: Department of Non-Resident Keralites Affairs (NORKA) in 1996. A separate agency for the implementation of NORKA programmes, NORKA-ROOTS was established in 2002. The department of NORKA has some interesting welfare programmes such as Karunyam for the repatriation of the mortal remains of NRKs who expire in host countries/regions, Pravasi Welfare Fund for distributing assistance of various types to the registered members and Santhwana for giving distress relief. In a way these are efforts to establish some rights for the NRKs, which the state government wishes to, guarantees and thereby earns legitimacy and power. Besides, the state government puts in some effort to develop a state-centred diaspora identity among the NRKs. These include promotion of Malayalam language and culture, cultural exchange programmes, schemes for promoting NRK participation in local/regional development, convening of NRK meets and recognition and promotion of NRK associations in host countries/regions. The department is also involved in the supply of some specialised services such as authentication of certificates, predeparture orientation programme, manpower placement and recruitment, data collection and research and helping to trace missing NRKs. But a review of the activities of the department suggests that they are best seen as statement of intention than really effective state intervention. This is obvious from the trivial allocation of plan funds to the department on the one hand and the poor track record of

Deterritorialisation of Keralam 19 Table 1.6  NORKA in state plan Year

State plan

NORKA plan (crores) Allocation (crores)

2002–3 4,026 2003–4 4,350 2004–5 4,800 2005–6 5,370 2006–7 6,681 2007–8 6,950 2008–9 7,701 2009–10 8,660 2010–11 10,000 2011–12

Expenditure (crores)

Allocation

Percentage Expenditure to total plan

Percentage to allocation

1.0 0.9 2.5 2.5 2.5 1.7 3.8 4.0 6.0 11.5

0.02 0.02 0.05 0.05 0.04 0.02 0.05 0.05 0.06

27.99 217.41 58.60 18.43 51.73 52.26 151.64 77.12 52.81 49.63

0.27 1.96 1.46 0.46 1.29 0.90 5.76 3.08 3.14 5.71

Source: Kerala State Planning Board: Plan Documents.

implementation on the other (see Table 1.6). For instance, the total allocation of plan funds to the department of NORKA during the tenth Five-Year Plan (2002–7) was just 9.35 crore rupees and the amount spent was 5.49 crores (58.67 per cent). Incidentally, the total size of the tenth plan of the state was 25,227 crore rupees. The 11th plan (2008–12) makes some improvement but does not change the picture. Our observation about the NORKA programmes will get more support when the plan allocation is compared with the requirements represented by the number of NRKs or the diaspora contribution to the state income reported earlier. In fact, the department activities appear too little even when they are compared with other collective initiatives. For instance, take the case of facilitating diaspora participation in the production of common culture. Cultural events sponsored by the NRKs in host countries/regions far outweigh the state-sponsored ones. This is true of so many other channels of interaction. If the diaspora engagement policy is exploitative in content, its explanation lies mainly in the political exclusion of the diaspora, which, as we argued in the chapter, is a major mismatch with the picture of inclusion of the diaspora in every other spheres of social life. The polity is not representing the non-resident citizens. They do not have a place or voice in the decision-making process. The divide we see is likely to widen in the future as the citizens become more mobile

20  K.N. Harilal and C.S. Akhil and the national or sub-national cultures get more deterritorialised. The sovereign power that the state commands over the non-resident citizens cannot be sustained for long if obligations of the diaspora are not matched with the rights they are given. No other right probably is more important than the right of democratic participation in making and running governments. The non-resident citizens should be given appropriate representation in decision-making forums. Contextually, the Indian Constitution has provision for nominated non-voting representation of Anglo-Indians in the Parliament and the state legislatures. As an interim solution, such a system of representation may be introduced by amending the constitution. A more appropriate solution would be creation of constituencies beyond the national/state boundaries.10 The same solution may not be acceptable for the diaspora who are not Indian citizens. Alternative methods of inclusion such as India International Parliament and Kerala International Parliament will have to be designed including persons of Indian/Kerala origin nominated through a well-laid-out and transparent method of nomination. In its meetings it will deliberate on a ‘World India list’ (World Kerala list) of subjects and advise the government. But opening of space for diaspora participation need not be limited to the higher scales. It can take place at different scales and in a multiplicity of institutions.

Notes 1 http://knowledge.sagepub.com/view/geography/n277.xml. 2 The General Agreement on Trade in Services, especially its provisions related to movement of natural persons (Mode 4), is a clear reflection of the emerging trends in labour flows across countries. Mode 4 refers to temporary movement of people as service providers. 3 Pravasi census was conducted by Economic and Statistics department of Kerala. It took place during the Sixth Economic Survey of Kerala in 2013 with a separate schedule. 4 Kerala Migration Survey has been extensively used by researchers. The major studies are Zachariah and Irudaya Rajan (2010, 2011, 2012, 2015), John (2012) and Zachariah et al. (2000). 5 According to KMS Rounds, the emigrants per 100 households have shown an increasing trend. It was 21.4 and 29 in 1998 and 2008, respectively. In 2011 it showed a slight increase to 29.3 per 100 households. 6 Pravasi Malayali Census, 2013, also supports the argument regarding the composition of migrants. According to it, out of 1,426,853 people, 7,524 were doctors, 90,898 were nurses, 53,876 were engineers, 10,011 were bank employees, 31,834 were IT professionals, 11,760 were teachers and 20,867 were managers. 7 During the state reorganisation, around 30 per cent of the people in Kanyakumari district were Malayalam-speaking. No recent estimates are available. Even if we take the proportion as 25 per cent, the number of

Deterritorialisation of Keralam 21 Malayalam-speaking people will be around 500,000 now. They will have to be counted as Kerala diaspora. 8 Suppose migration and remittances are having a favourable impact on domestic production. If so, the income effect of migration will certainly be higher than that of remittances. Conversely, if the impact on domestic production is adverse, the net addition could be lower than that of the remittances. 9 This data was taken from the Facebook pages/accounts of the politicians from 1 to 15 October 2015. 10 There are 11 constituencies for French residents overseas, each electing one representative to the national assembly. They were created in 2010 redistricting of French legislative constituencies, the aim of which was to enable French citizens overseas to be represented as such, rather than vote in a constituency on French territory, as was the case previously.

References Appadurai, A. 1990. ‘Disjuncture and Difference in the Global Culture Economy’, Theory, Culture, and Society 7: 295–310. Balakrishnan, Pulapre. 1999. ‘Land Reforms and the Question of Food in Kerala’, Economic and Political Weekly 34(2), May 22: 1272–1280. Clifford, J. 1997. Routes: Travel and Translation in the Late Twentieth Century. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Cohen, R. 1997. Global Diasporas: An Introduction. London: UCL Press. Corden, W.M. and Neary J. Peter. 1982. ‘Booming Sector and De-industrialisation in a Small Open Economy’, The Economic Journal 92: 825–848. Fardmanesh, M. 1991. ‘Dutch Disease Economics and the Oil Syndrome: An Empirical Study’, World Development 19(6): 711–717. Gamlen, A. 2006. ‘Diaspora Engagement Policies: What Are They, and What Kind of States Use Them?’, Working Paper No. 32, Centre on Migration Policy and Society, University of Oxford. Harilal, K.N. 2006. ‘The External Sector’, Alternative Economic Survey, India 2005–2006, Alternative Survey Group, New Delhi: Daanish Books, pp. 73–85. Harilal, K.N. and K.K. Eswaran. 2015. ‘Agrarian Question and Local Governments in Kerala’, Occasional Paper No. 2015: 3, Government of Kerala Endowment Unit on Local Self Governments (RULSG), Centre for Development Studies, Thiruvananthapuram. Harilal, K.N. and K.J. Joseph. 2003. ‘Stagnation and Revival of Kerala Economy: An Open Economy Perspective’, Economic and Political Weekly, Volume 38, No.23, pp. 2286–94. John, Raju. 2012. ‘Role of Migration in Inequality: An Analysis in the Context of Kerala’, Unpublished MPhil Thesis, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. Karayil, Sajitha Beevi. 2015. ‘Movement of Natural Persons and Sieve of Immigration Policy: A Study on India’s Mode 4 Exports to United States’, Unpublished PhD Thesis, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi.

22  K.N. Harilal and C.S. Akhil Nair, P.R.G. 1999. ‘Return of Overseas Contract Workers and the Rehabilitation and Development in Kerala (India): A Critical Account of Policies, Performance and Prospects’, International Migration 37(1): 209–242. Narayana, D. and C.S. Venkiteswaran. 2013. ‘Study on the Domestic Migrant Labour in Kerala’, Sponsored by Ministry of Labour and Skills, Government of Kerala. Nayyar, D. 1994. Migration, Remittances and Capital Flows: The Indian Experience. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Pani, N. and K. Jafar. 2010. ‘Mass Education-Led Growth and Non-agrarian Villages: Longterm Results of the Kerala Model’, Oxford Development Studies 38(1): 25–42. Passi, A. 2003. ‘Territory’, in J. Agnew, K. Mitchell and G. Toal (eds), A Companion to Political Geography, Oxford: Blackwell, pp. 109–122. Popescu, Gabriel. 2006. ‘Geopolitics of Scale and Cross-Border Cooperation in Eastern Europe: The Case of Romanian-Ukrainian-Moldovan Borderlands’, in J.W. Scott (eds), EU Enlargement, Region Building and Shifting Borders of Inclusion and Exclusion, Aldershot: Ashgate, pp. 35–52. Prakash, B.A. 1998. ‘Gulf Migration and Its Economic Impact, The Kerala Experience’, Economic and Political Weekly, 12 December 1998. Sack, R.D. 1986. Human Territoriality: Its Theory and History. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Storey, D. 2001. Territory: The Claiming of Space. Harlow, Essex: Pearson Prentice Hall. Tsagarousianou, R. 2004. ‘Rethinking the Concept of Diaspora: Mobility, Connectivity, and Communication in Globalised World’, Westminster Papers in Communication and Culture (University of Westminster, London) 1(1): 52–65. ISSN 1744–6708 (Print); 1744–6716 (Online). Zachariah, K.C. and S. Irudaya Rajan. 2010. ‘Migration Monitoring Study, 2008: Emigration and Remittances in the Context of Surge in Oil Prices’, Working Paper No. 424, Centre for Development Studies, Thiruvananthapuram. Zachariah, K.C. and S. Irudaya Rajan. 2011. ‘From Kerala to Kerala Via the Gulf: Emigration Experiences of Return Emigrants’, Working Paper No. 443, Centre for Development Studies, Thiruvananthapuram. Zachariah, K.C. and S. Irudaya Rajan. 2012. ‘Inflexion in Kerala’s Gulf Connection: Report on Kerala Migration Survey, 2011’, Working Paper No. 450, Centre for Development Studies, Thiruvananthapuram. Zachariah, K.C. and S. Irudaya Rajan. 2015. ‘Dynamics of Emigration and Remittances in Kerala: Results from the Kerala Migration Survey 2014’, Working Paper No. 463, Centre for Development Studies, Thiruvananthapuram. Zachariah, K.C., E.T. Mathew and S. Irudaya Rajan. 1999. ‘Impact of Migration on Kerala’s Economy’, Working Paper No. 297, Centre for Development Studies, Thiruvananthapuram. Zachariah, K.C. E.T. Mathew and S. Irudaya Rajan. 2000. ‘Socio-Economic and Demographic Consequences of Migration in Kerala’, Working Paper No. 303, Centre for Development Studies, Thiruvanantharpuam.

2 Resettlement of Indian transnational labour migrant families of Gulf Questions of income, neoliberal subjectivity and oikonomia Shareena Banu C.P. The current pattern of enforced expatriation of the temporary contract labourers from India to the Gulf region reveals certain new social issues in the neoliberal era. The plights of this lower-class labour force and their transnational families at their home in Kerala offer a different ‘socio-spatial spectacle’. These emigrant households are mostly left isolated with only their wife and children without any social support. Further studies show that, on the one hand, the neoliberal subjectivity penetrates deep into the traditional family values, and on the other, the migrant labourers have hardly any laid-out social security system even in the Gulf. They live under severe labour conditions and insecure job prospects, changing their class position back to the same povertystricken stage when they left. This chapter, therefore, concentrates on these dual economic and social impacts on transnational migrant families. The new migration trend is presented in theory by way of invoking Giorgio Agamben’s use of the term ‘oikonomia’, which in Greek means management of household (Agamben, 2007). Given that, we extrapolate that this transnational labour force emanates political meanings that seek new attention. It also raises new pressing governance challenges, especially with regard to Indian resettlement policy. This should be considered as encompassing the contemporary debates on political economy of the household and its contemporary global references. Equally, Agamben employs the term to a metaphoric time to evaluate emerging modern power. According to him, ‘Inquire into the paths by which and the reasons why power in the West has assumed the form of an oikonomia, that is, a government of men. It locates itself in the wake of Michel Foucault’s investigations into the genealogy of governmentality’ (Agamben, 2007).

24  Shareena Banu, C.P. Hence, the idea of oikonomia, which stands as central referential position in Agamben’s new political theory of power, is applicable generally. This is an impelling new political commentary that has recently generated a new domain of theorization even in the field of migration and spatiality studies. It has enabled this study to relocate the ‘translocal’ labour alienation. The main context here is widespread global unrest and questions of human rights. The problems that arose more pertinently are the current neoliberal economic shift. Its impact with reference to Gulf migrants introduces Indians as ‘population of neoliberal governance’ into the questions of ‘oikonomia’. It would also mean analysing migration as a political activity. The symptoms of neoliberal logic marginally unfold to us. The notion of ‘state’ achieves a new context. The governance of the household economy and new notion of power coincide. The study refers to the new economic and social relation of power under capitalism and what the international migrant labour undergoes in such situations, oikonomia or for the management of self and care of family, in relation to their sense of being responsible social agency. Simultaneously, the emerging ‘migrant labour consciousness’ strives to stand politically against the capitalist social production of spaces and shrinking values of equality.

The context of study The family organization of the non-resident Keralites (NRKs) seeks our attention as a new sociological phenomenon. These expatriates from the Indian state of Kerala form a substantial population of the Indian community working in the Persian Gulf region. They are gradually emerging as a significant transnational group. New communication systems such as Facebook and blogs, Twitter, Gulf newspapers, Malayalam television channels, reality shows, movie productions housed in Gulf and Gulf tours of movie stars catalyse and intensify their community being. Sustained interaction with their wives and children, and relatives in the homeland, makes these expatriates a new regional reality of political significance. Majority of these families include lower-class contractual labour migrants with insecure job prospects (Zachariah and Irudaya Rajan, 2012). They exhibit economic and social distress like any other global labour migrant family and travel between the two different economic zones in every six months to two years. So their families are under the pressure of maintaining the household in the absence of husbands. This has in turn created a new social category of married women called ‘Gulf Wives’ (GW), who are in numbers more than one million (Zachariah and Irudaya Rajan, 2012).

Resettlement of labour migrant families of Gulf 25 This is the empirical context that defines these transnational Gulf families into which this chapter looks. With the increasing remittance and the dependence of the state’s economy on the inflow, the Gulf Malayalies have gained considerable economic significance. The growth, mostly in the form of family investments, is exponential, and as per the latest survey, it was 70,000 crores in 2013 (Zachariah and Irudaya Rajan, 2015). Despite all these, they are aware of impending repatriation at any point of time, as was the situation during the Gulf War in 1990, leading to a mass exodus. The Arab workforce nationalization and related labour law reforms (e.g. the Nitaqat law in Saudi Arabia in 2013) and other new policies in the Gulf Corporation Council (GCC) adversely affect these unskilled and semi-skilled labourers (Zachariah et al., 2014). They live in constant fear of losing their jobs, and the situation brings them face to face with the real state of the mass unemployment at the other end of the labour chain back home in Kerala. Hence, frequently shifting labour laws and reforms are the main contexts of the debates on the social security schemes for the transnational families. In 1996, Kerala state government instituted the Non-Resident Keralites Affairs to formally address this issue. Working in the unorganized private sector simultaneously forces the labourers to cope with the changing economic and political conditions in the Gulf and their homeland. This makes their social psychology and self-perception very complex. They have low wages and bleak job prospects in the homeland also. However, without sufficient employment generation at home, it accentuates their apprehension, about mass labour deportation from the Gulf. Even after living for two generations, their status as temporary contract labourers has not been changed. Out of these circumstances emerge the unique social existence of their transnational family and their social networks. This accounts for the intensifying family crisis and their labour vulnerability in the neoliberal era of GCC’s geopolitics and economic life. It is against this background that the ‘transnational’ family of the Gulf labour migrant’s household in Kerala is analysed. This study more comprehensively looks at certain socio-spatial dimensions of the household that entail questions of power, subjectivity and resistance. Therefore, the principal area of exposition is the methodological interface among the transnational labour migration, state policy, and culture in the light of the particular socio-spatial aspects like the changing family structure and related questions of gender. Limiting the scope of study, the term ‘transnational’ is employed in a generic sense with emphasis on regional specificities. It is indicative of the dynamic cross-cultural linkages and economic integration

26  Shareena Banu, C.P. displaying local and global values, however, with exclusive attention to spatiality of political economy of family life. It tries to underline the institution of family as a new locus of power reflecting the neoliberal governance and its deeper impacts.

Methodology Methodologically, it can be argued that the recent situation of Gulf labour migrants of Kerala demands a new socio-spatial transnational perspective. The reason is that unlike other overseas Indians who lived outside as more or less permanent and settled diaspora communities, these Malayali expatriates have always remained Indian citizens abroad. Consequently, they are regarded as a transitive diaspora community living in the Middle East only with working visa and without any citizenship till today (Weiner, 1982; Jain, 2003). For long, migration studies on Indians abroad have been with respect to the overseas settled Indians (people of Indian origin after 1999), but the transitory life of Gulf migrants from India has remained only as a minor context. Diaspora studies had, earlier on, addressed various socio-political issues as a new domain of social inquiry. They are the social and racial inequality, unique ethno-national identity, cultural problems of relocation, longing for an imaginary homeland, cultural differences and isolation, assimilation with host society, patriotic sense of historical belonging to the culture of origin and multicultural rights (Jain, 1970; Kymlicka and He, 1995; Parekh, 2000). However, this was discussed without paying any serious attention to the transnational cross-border experiences of the Indians as the case of Gulf emigrants of Kerala with regard to the question of citizenship. Today’s situation, in addition to those earlier debates based on methodological nationalism as its framework, adopts a new transnational approach that helps address this lacuna. As a result, bringing the same under the human right discourse and global labour rights issues assumes inescapable significance. Thus, the issue, which until recently was excluded from international political and policy involvements, started receiving more attention than ever before. There is, therefore, a major shift in attention to more politically driven concerns about the economic and social inequality. This shift has brought about a post-national spatial-social analysis of labour with regard to the larger effects of global economy, and hence, there is a renewed interest in the spatial location of the contemporary international labour migration. Transnational border exchanges of values and social remittances are influencing the democratic restructuring globally (Levitt, 2001). The

Resettlement of labour migrant families of Gulf 27 increased emphasis on the social field of activities and the lack of sense of belonging, in the context of urban capitalism, intensify the formation of a new methodological paradigm (Schiller et al., 1995; Wimmer and Schiller, 2002). New imperial forms of power, subject formation, gender construction and domination, increasing urban poverty and social inequality under the neoliberal capitalist situations are becoming the emerging context of study. Family as an institution is increasingly becoming the main locus of neoliberal governmentality (Gordon and Miller, 1991). Within its defined scope of study, the transnational labour family life evolves as a new cultural theme (Faist and Eyup, 2004) as well. This study looks at the family organization of the Gulf labour migrants with respect to their changing household economy. Detachment from self and autonomy grows in new forms, especially under conditions of objectified subsistence outside the established traditional family. Migrants are forced to set up a ‘disoriented household’. Family socialization, gender relations and household governance are more exposed to market in the neoliberal context.

Transnational labour family and reunion: the context of utopian dream household economy of alienated labour globally Early days of emigration from Kerala to the Gulf started in the 1970s. During that stage, migrants’ life and personal experiences were very hard. They worked as manual labourers in the then emerging crude oil economy during the Gulf boom (1972–83) (Zachariah et al., 2003). Later, many people from Kerala went exploring their job prospects and opportunities. The hot pot of oil in the desert left open holistic lifetime fortunes for them, igniting the spirit of many more young men of Kerala to follow the same path. This was the first of the many spectacles unfolded in the social life of Kerala. This migration provided an international economic exposure in the post-colonial era. The state thereby emerged into limelight for sending its educated semi-skilled and unskilled labour force across the borders to West Asia. Intense social network and family ties followed connecting the Gulf region and the family members of the migrants back home. But it was actualized then only through the old channels of correspondences and informal communication systems and the transaction of money. It is very difficult to understand this transnational ethnography and its cultural and historic effects on family from the perspective of institutional processes. But from the recent socio-spatial perspective of

28  Shareena Banu, C.P. ‘transnational family’, the new economic opportunity in the Gulf in the 1970s can be appraised as creating a new metaphoric context – in the form of a ‘Gulf dream’ – within which the institutional setup was spatially relocated. The discursive shift on the (transnational) family with reference to the Gulf has happened in such a manner that it is also suggestive of the reorganization of household expectations under the newly achieved material prospects. Early Gulf dream of almost all expatriates was to have a true household to base their self located regionally. This illustrates their quest for a permanent dwelling. It further reveals the intersectionality of class, family and status dynamics among the labour migrants. The dream household was pursued with the hope to return shortly with their savings and to acquire a new plot to rebuild the old cottage into a concrete house. They put in years’ long tough grind hours under harsh weather conditions to achieve this goal. Families also continue to live with this hope, wishing to achieve only this end. As life becomes dreadful without family care and social support, what sustains many is the thought to restart a new life once all debts are cleared. However, in actuality, many of them earn only a meagre sum and could save very little to return and, thus, end up staying, endlessly shifting from one job to another as manual labourers. Despite their longing to return, they could not have settled peacefully to lead a post-expatriate life. It is only a small section of rich non-resident Indians who achieved substantial social mobility. But the lower-income migrants’ social existence is with a subject position unique to temporary labour migrants which manifest their economic and social insecurities. They try to achieve a new reference group social status, which is unique to lower middle-class labour migrants’ transnational family existence. Economic remittance has only lately started to interact with the cultural. More recently, there are also indirect effects on the state’s economic behaviour, occupational and income generation patterns, higher education policy, urbanization and housing policy. These are some of the important aspects of the larger social character which draw us to the regional matters of global labour migration. Nevertheless, it can be argued that Kerala society by and large has remained wedded to two characterizations. First, this includes the emphasis on traditional family values based on patriarchy, and second, this includes the young out-migrants (both internal and international), especially the youth wishing to return to Kerala aspiring to obtain government jobs. This reveals that though the emergence of a new Gulf economy changed the economic profile of the state, the Gulf migrant family’s worldview continued to be dominated by

Resettlement of labour migrant families of Gulf 29 and traversed through similar value inroads as the mainstream people of Kerala. After getting integrated to the bigger economy, they have gained economic status. Hence, the non-residents of Kerala become a new social category. They are becoming a politically influential interest group in Kerala politics. Apart from a few interventions the lowerclass Gulf labour families are still an unorganized political force. They are a category within category called as below poverty line NRKs. Apparently, their class status is fluctuating between middle class and lower class. For many, their transformed status has brought financial independence to them. But many fall prey to neoliberal blandishments, resulting in more indebtedness in the form of house loans, vehicle loans and so on. In addition to the debts to meet the expenses to obtain a visa. This again, cyclically, brings them back to poverty and the same old economic hardship that leads to selling of the property they earned arduously. New economic prospects opened at their doorsteps, with a few understanding the nature of their household in distress. Wealth and migrants are slowly becoming a synonym for consumerist culture in Kerala though the lives of average migrants remain the same with fluctuating family prospects. One of the parents, the father, is absentee visitor in most Gulf households which creates a real psychosocial predicament, with children becoming social errant with early exposure to hefty pocket money. These social pressures posing challenges to existing family structure are discussed more concretely in the following analysis.

Modern democratic household and development discourse in post-colonial Kerala Before locating this socio-spatial shift in the family orientation of singleparent households of the Gulf families (also includes male-oriented households as in the cases of Gulf migrant nurses) (Percot, 2006), it is important to make a brief overview of the earlier democratic discourses and political movements in order to culturally locate the life of the lower middle-class Gulf households. The period between independence and the beginning of migration (between 1947 and 1970) witnessed an epoch making watershed in Kerala politics. Many breakeven points in democratizing the state such as land reforms happened during this period. New sources of income for the poor were generated by state revenue, and this led to new levels of economic transition in slow pace (Balakrishnan, 1999). Social reform movements and state legislation together resulted in transforming the public sphere. Ever since the formation of the state, the communism movement has also

30  Shareena Banu, C.P. majorly contributed to increase the economic status of the working class in Kerala. The aftermath of caste negotiations between communities turned the political economy in favour of social justice. As a result, scant attention was paid to new employment generation for educated youth. However, the cultural fabric of the Kerala family remained more or less the same. Women had no direct influence on the political decisions. Economic reforms in Kerala had influenced the joint family system and patriarchy; nevertheless, the democratic reorganization of gender norms remained untouched by the state reforms. In modern Kerala, while favouring the nuclear household values, old mode of family life remained largely intact. Development discourses then all the way through encouraged women’s freedom, educational awareness and physical health care, yet the dominant power relations within the family governed gender constructions (Davika, 2009). One of the telling success stories in the second phase of the state’s development discourse was the literacy movement which started in the 1980s. This endeavour became the defining feature of modern Kerala society (Kumar, 1993), authenticated by the human development indexes. It is generally represented in their highly evolved sense of social equality, especially reflected in the areas of social achievements in primary education, low infant mortality and women’s health (Sen, 1999). Primary knowledge of reading and writing, the marked feature of reformed Kerala, was codified and edified as the main source of political movements for social egalitarianism. It has been a nationalist and post-colonial debate and Marxist ideological interpenetration into the heartland creating new public sphere (Habermas, 1989). It represents a democratically elected people’s avant-garde consciousness in harmony with a newly earned reading culture through library revolution and shared political and democratic eagerness for a truly egalitarian society. Despite all these efforts for social mobility, economic growth was less than anticipated. Yet Gulf migration became more appealing in the 1980s. Many unemployed youth left home. Poverty and unemployment were the main causes that changed the aim of social reform movements which essentially intended to empower the individual household in Kerala. The democratic changes were deeply embedded in the state’s emancipatory agenda to eradicate poverty; however, it remained unfulfilled in the context of labour unrest. Educated youth were out of jobs within the economy. Gulf labour migration forced Kerala society to accept class as more potently informing Kerala population alongside the demand for the social recognition of lower castes and other backward classes. The then emerging public sphere and the rational and

Resettlement of labour migrant families of Gulf 31 political selfhood orientated the newly learned generation to dream of socialism. It has brought new insights of class and social inequality with increased sensitivity to the cause of labour class through unionism and sense of social parity and equal distribution of wealth. The fact remained that the visibly streamlined cluster of leadership design in Kerala, especially in the line of left orientation, left a mark in rewriting the agrarian history of Kerala. The post-reform stage is visible through the slow disillusionment with Kerala modernity and accentuating the economic discontent of the lower class. The means of migratory impulse among the most educated youth increased to make rural society come to cities including outside states such as Chennai (formerly Madras) and Kolkata (formerly Calcutta) looking for jobs and many to the Gulf. In this stage, the questions of political power sharing and masculine appropriation of household remain unquestioned, making the tribals, dalits and women face economic and social impoverishment.

Female-headed households of Gulf migrants and new governance paradigm In the following two decades of Gulf migration, very few labour families made it into middle-class status. However, this in itself has become a major economic spectacle as Gulf migration showed relatively easy upward social mobility. During this period, consumerism in Kerala was on the high, which was steadily increasing among the Gulf families. This is an early sign of achieving a middle-class confidence among labour households. Earlier, it was the unmarried youth who went to the Gulf. But later married men also went with the hope of starting a new life, eagerly waiting to return soon. This was without realizing the trauma of distant family relations and wife becoming the main locus of household management. Women were managing the material resources for the well-being of the family, which increased their role. Sexuality and material life emerged as the central Gulf discourses in Kerala. It changed status of family as a relatively new site of power and gender relationships. Marriage proposals based on class, importance of gold and luxury goods and new joint property ownership patterns of spouses can be perceived as the economic behaviour of the new socially mobile class. Conspicuous consumption that symbolizes mostly the urban youth and migrants is considered as part of modern cosmopolitan imagination of material life. This has eventually fallen back upon the socialist dream and class consciousness. The complexity of Kerala modernity was such that it indulged in formation of distinctive fragmentations of social critique. With Gulf migration,

32  Shareena Banu, C.P. a new gender division of labour occurred. The migrant labourers were new hope. Through migration the concept of male household has been reinforced. Material production of relations affects the family value. It reinforced gender roles in its extreme. Nancy Frazer (2013) argues the development discourses in general have failed to challenge the gender norms. It has to be viewed alongside the other egalitarian movements addressing the present neoliberal crisis. In the contemporary context, the problems of the Gulf families and GW gain attention only through social media as a failure of ‘patriarchal family romance’, and the state’s social security network scheme was able to provide only financial assistance at some level to BPL NRKs. This has confined the meaning of welfare state. The welfare patriarchy bestows itself a limited role to the state. According to Kodoth and Varghese (2012), ‘That protectionism reflects the state’s investment in the gender norms and provides a foil for controlled informality’ (Kodoth and Varghese, 2012). The Gulf migrant family thus poses challenges as a new context of governance. Gulf migrant family brings back the question of gender and power in development. Culturally also Kerala has maintained close kinship marriages, as in matrilocality practice of Kerala. Migration tends to reintroduce it tacitly in the case of GW. Single-women households are facing social crisis in terms of household headship. Such households where husbands are away have to gain emotional support independent of relatives. There are reports suggesting many would be inclined to spend time within the mother’s household and long for close family and social support even after marriage and children. It has been viewed that lesser social interaction and tensed relationship with mothers-inlaw in the household create high stress levels (Mukhopadhyay et al., 2007; Eapen, 2009). Currently, the socio-psychology of transnational wives has come to the forefront as they face all the strain of transnational labour migrant household. International labour migration under globalization has in general brought to light the emergence of the professional care economy as an effect of neoliberal policy. The neoliberal strategy is to pay close attention to private-sector workers and their family. Also, the global migration of labourers and their GW and their family economics add new dimensions to gender theories on care work. These GW are unpaid labourers contributing to economic development. As T.N. Madan designates, in the traditional Indian family system women held the status of a real Grihasta, or complete householder (Madan, 1988). Reporting cases of mental illness among GW is another major issue. There are increasing numbers of GW approaching psychiatrists for medical help. The state mental health authorities have begun to work

Resettlement of labour migrant families of Gulf 33 along with local organizations and non-governmental organizations (Eapen, 2009). Social stigma is attached to women’s mental health problems; therefore, the helpline services of local psychiatric clinics hardly reach out to the women in distress. Their clinical condition is called Gulf wives’ ‘Friday syndrome’. It strengthens the argument of the close-knit existence of modern psychiatry, social security issues, questions concerning deterritorialized subjectivities and labour issues under the grand umbrella of neoliberal capitalism (Guattari, 1984). Migration and family welfare is yet to become a public matter concerning women and development. Lack of social security affects the psychological balance of filiations and the management of whole migrant family household. For men, this adds to their sense of job insecurity in their place of destination. They bestow the parenting responsibilities to their wives who become responsible organizers attending to their family’s extra emotional prerequisites, socialization, formal education and material and financial welfare. Many men do not get family visas, or they cannot afford to bring the family. Homelessness creates a sense of terminal existence. They refer back to own family as a ‘metaphor of the real’, which they have left in search of completing the unknown meaning of oikonomia or the management of the household (Agamben, 2007). The role of the father or male is to manage the household from inside ideally, and to conduct it for complete happiness, which is now happening extraneously. This exemplifies the chronicle of a long-distance transnational family household. The state policy is yet to incorporate the real migrant workers’ subject positions to be relocated within the larger discourses of development and labour. Hence to conclude, the Gulf wife’s role as the main homemaker requires a new approach and should be looked at from the new questions on transnational family and gender. Migration has socially reproduced the image of Kerala women as domestic oriented and educated to manage the household (Kodoth and Eapen, 2005). With comparative economic independence, in the absence of their men they are still invisible in the occupational sectors and the political sphere (Gulati, 1993). As the responsibilities multiply, it leads to increased familial complexities, and at the same time, the structured gender roles are further upheld with traditional status of women.

References Agamben, Giorgio. 2007. The Kingdom and the Glory: For a Theological Genealogy of Economy and Government. Homo Sacer II. Palo Alto, CA: Stanford University Press.

34  Shareena Banu, C.P. Balakrishnan, Pulapre. 1999. ‘Land Reforms and the Question of Food in Kerala’, Economic and Political Weekly 34(21): 1272–1280. Davika, J. 2009. ‘Bodies Gone Awry: The Abjection of Sexuality in Development Discourse in Contemporary Kerala’, Indian Journal of Gender Studies 16, February: 21–46. Eapen, Mridul. 2009. ‘Mental Health of Women in Kerala’, Samyukta: A Journal of Women’s Studies 2b, November. http://samyukta.info/site/node/276. Accessed 8 September 2015. Faist, T. and O. Eyup (eds). 2004. Transnational Social Spaces. Agents, Networks and Institutions. Aldershot: Ashgate. Frazer, Nancy. 2013. Fortunes of Feminism: From State-Managed Capitalism to Neoliberal Crisis. London: Verso. Gordon, Collin and Peter Miller (eds). 1991. The Foucault Effect: Studies in Governmentality. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press. Guattari, Felix. 1984. Molecular Revolution: Psychiatry and Politics. Trans. Rosemary Sheed. Harmondsworth: Penguin. Gulati, Leela. 1993. In the Absence of Their Men. New Delhi: Sage. Habermas, Jurgen. 1989. The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere: An Inquiry into a Category of Bourgeois Society. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Jain, Prakash C. 2003. ‘Culture and Economy in an “Incipient” Diaspora: Indians in the Persian Gulf Region’, in Bhikhu Parekh (ed.), Culture and Economy in the Indian Diaspora, London: Routledge, pp. 102–122. Jain, Ravinder K. 1970. South Indians on the Plantation Frontiers in Malaya. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. Kodoth, Praveena and Mridul Eapen. 2005. ‘Looking beyond Gender Parity: Gender Inequities of Some Dimensions of Well-Being in Kerala’, Economic and Political Weekly XL(30), July 23: 3287–3286. Kodoth, Praveena and V.J. Varghese. 2012. ‘Protecting Women or Endangering the Emigration Process: Emigration Women, Domestic Workers, Gender and State Policy’, Economic and Political Weekly XLVII(43), 27 October: 56–65. K.S. 2000. ‘Special Story Feature “Engulfed in Loneliness and Fear”’, The Hindu, Sunday, 16 July. http://www.thehindu.com/2000/07/16/stories/ 13160461.htm. Accessed 8 September 2015. Kumar, Mohan S. 1993. ‘Literacy Movement in Kerala: One Step Forward, Two Step Backwards’, Economic and Political Weekly 28(41), 9 October: 2187–2191. Kymlicka, Will and Baogang He (eds). 2005. Multiculturalism in Asia. London: Oxford University Press. Levitt, Peggy. 2001. The Transnational Villagers. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press. Levitt, Peggy and Nina Glick Schiller. 2004. ‘Conceptualizing Simultaneity: The Transnational Social Field Perspective on Society’, International Migration Review 28: 1002–1039.

Resettlement of labour migrant families of Gulf 35 Madan, T.N. 1988. Way of Life: King, Householder, Renouncer: Essays in Honour of Louis Dumont. New Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass. Mukhopadhyay, Swapna, Jayanti Basu and S. Irudaya Rajan. 2007. ‘Mental Health, Gender Ideology and Women’s Status in Kerala’, in Swapna Mukhopadhyay (ed.), The Enigma of the Kerala Woman: A Failed Promise of Literacy, New Delhi: Social Science Press: Orient Blackswan, pp. 71–101. Parekh, Bhikhu. 2000. Rethinking Multiculturalism; Cultural Diversity and Political Theory. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Percot, Marie. 2006. ‘Indian Nurses in the Gulf: Two Generations of Female Migration’, South Asia Research 26(1): 41–62. Schiller, Nina Glick, Linda Basch and Cristina Szanton Blanc. 1995. ‘From Immigrant to Transmigrant: Theorizing Transnational Migration’, Anthropological Quarterly 68(1), January: 48–63. Sen, Amartya. 1999. Development as Freedom. New York: Oxford University Press. Weiner, Myron. 1982. ‘International Migration and Development: Indians in Persian Gulf’, Population and Development Review 8(1): 1–36. Wimmer, Andreas and Nina Glick Schiller. 2002. ‘Methodological Nationalism and Beyond: Nation-State Building, Migration and the Social Sciences’, Global Networks 2(4): 301–334. Zachariah, K.C. and S. Irudaya Rajan. 2012. A Decade of Kerala’s Gulf Connection, 1998–2011. New Delhi: Orient Blackswan. Zachariah, K.C. and S. Irudaya Rajan. 2015. ‘Dynamics of Emigration and Remittances in Kerala: Results from the Kerala Migration Survey 2014’, Centre for Development Studies Working Paper No. 463, Thiruvananthapuram. Zachariah, K.C., S. Irudaya Rajan and Jolin Joseph. 2014. ‘Kerala Emigration to Saudi Arabia: Prospects under the Nitaqat Law’, Chapter 16, in S. Irudaya Rajan (ed.), India Migration Report 2014: Diaspora and Development, New Delhi: Routledge, pp. 229–248. Zachariah, K.C., E.T. Mathew and S. Irudaya Rajan. 2003. Dynamics of Migration in Kerala: Dimensions, Determinants and Consequences. Hyderabad: Orient Longman.

3 The need for systemic reform in migrant labour recruitment Ray Jureidini

Criticism of the conditions of migrant workers in Qatar, particularly low-wage workers in the construction industry, began in earnest following the awarding in 2010 of the FIFA soccer World Cup for 2022. The main criticism and calls for reform or abolition of the Kafala system were articulated in reports published by organizations such as the International Labour Organization (2013), Amnesty International (2013), Human Rights Watch (2012), the UN Special Rapporteur for Migrant Rights (Crepeau, 2014), the International Trade Union Confederation (2014), a government-commissioned report by DLA Piper (2014) and the Qatar Foundation (QF) (Jureidini, 2014). In April 2013, QF released its Mandatory Standards for Migrant Worker Welfare for Contractors and Sub-Contractors. Based on Qatari labour law and international labour conventions, these standards covered a range of issues, including recruitment, housing, food, health and safety and transport. Since its introduction, compliance with the standards became a condition for the qualification of all tenders for new capital works contracts of QF. The QF standards were also adopted by other clients of the state, such as Qrail, Rasgas and the Supreme Committee for the 2022 World Cup (with some revisions on housing). Of relevance to this discussion was the recruitment provision in the standards, based on Qatar Labour Law (2004), Article 33, which states that licensed recruitment agents are prohibited from receiving from workers ‘any sums representing recruitment fees or expenses or any other costs’. Because this article was generally interpreted as applying only to Qatar, it was assumed that if workers paid outside of Qatar, namely in their country of origin, it would be acceptable – and away from the purview, jurisdiction and responsibility of the Qatari authorities, as well as employers and placement agencies in Qatar. In 2011, a World Bank study of remittances between Nepal and Qatar

Systemic reform in migrant labour recruitment 37 showed that a proportion of money taken by recruitment agencies in Nepal was finding its way back to Qatar through illegal informal fund transfers to ‘recruitment service companies’ in exchange for the labour supply contracts (Endo and Afram, 2011). It was also found by Jureidini (2014) that these informal payments were being made to middle management personnel of the employing companies in Qatar, who were in a position to choose the recruitment agencies in the origin countries and pocket commissions of up to US$600 or more per worker. From the call for tenders to the completion of the project, there are a number of areas where red flags can be raised for potential corruption (Verité, 2013). What follows is a descriptive account of the structural mechanisms and pressures that lead to workers’ paying large sums of money to recruitment agencies in their home countries and how these funds are disbursed. The reforms of these processes, including the banning of worker payments, have a number of difficulties in implementation.

Inception of labour demand The demand for recruitment of migrant labour to Qatar originates in capital works projects by clients of the state who call for competitive tenders. Apart from possible cartels where it is decided who tenders and who should win a contract, there may be personnel who have influence over decision-making who extort funds from a tendering company with the promise of securing the contract. In some cases, dummy bidders can be arranged to create a façade that an already-favoured company will win the bid against competitors. Influence (or wasta) is also an important element in many high-level contractual arrangements where members of prominent families may be given preference. Overall costs of production go up as a result of such interference. These levels of possible corruption are difficult to prove without whistle-blowers from within, and one way to get evidence is through ‘sting’ operations. For example, the director of payments and revenue at QF’s financial affairs department was alleged to have requested a ‘gift’ from the regional manager of a French insurance company, AXA, in the spring of 2014. The company had been providing health and life insurance to QF since 2012. A QF employee asked for QR2 million (US$549,587) to facilitate the contract’s renewal. The AXA representative told his CEO, who called a QF executive who in turn contacted the police. The insurance manager was told to insist that the QF employee’s boss, a Qatari who served as director of the financial

38  Ray Jureidini affairs department, be present for the transaction. The three men met at a coffee shop in the Pearl-Qatar in 2014 to finalize the arrangement in a conversation that was recorded by police. By this point, the QF employees had increased their requested amount to QR3 million (US$824,335). They then met in the lobby of a prestigious hotel around 10 p.m. on 14 July 2014 while being watched by undercover police officers. When they proceeded to the parking lot where the insurance company employee took a bag containing the money and handed it to the Qatari director, the police intervened and arrested the two men. In June 2015 the two employees were sentenced to five years in jail and ordered to jointly pay a fine of QR3 million (US$824,335) (Kovessy and Sheble, 2015a, 2015b). Another element in tendering concerns the tender process itself and is more directly related to recruitment. Following the pre-qualification phase of tenders, the evaluation process has two main phases: the technical evaluation and the commercial evaluation. The technical phase determines if a company can meet all the technical requirements and capacity required to complete the project within the time frame required. Once the technical evaluation of tenders has been completed, the commercial evaluation (a completely separate procedure) requires that the lowest cost bid be awarded the contract. This is commensurate with the World Bank guidelines for procurement bids (World Bank, 2011). The company awarded the contract may be asked to reduce its budget by another 10 per cent. The fierce negotiations that take place squeeze the budgets of the contractors, who either want to break into the Qatar construction sector or ensure they remain in the market where billions of dollars are earmarked for construction of the facilities for the 2022 World Cup. The financial pressure means that they, in turn, squeeze the profit margins of their subcontractors and their sub-subcontractors down the supply chain. One of the ways in which costs may be kept low, both for the bid itself and for the subcontractors’ bids with the contractor, is not to pay for recruitment costs, but this is rarely transparent in the bidding process. In the commercial tender, a detailed breakdown of labour costs is not revealed; only an aggregate figure for labour costs, including salaries, is provided. Details of the subcontractors that will be involved are also rarely provided. Thus, for many decades, the practice of many companies, both contractors and subcontractors, has been a policy of refusing to pay recruitment costs for the migrant labour they employ. This has been amply rewarded by an almost infinite supply of cheap labour from the poorer Asian countries, who are desperate to find

Systemic reform in migrant labour recruitment 39 work, and with wages higher than in their home countries; and willing to take loans and sell their assets to pay recruitment agents for the job. Further, as is well known but rarely discussed openly, many of the employers in the receiving country are paid bribes by recruitment agencies in the origin countries in order to secure the labour supply contract. Thus, they not only do not pay recruitment costs but are paid to recruit. In addition, when personnel for the employing company travel to the origin countries to do the skills testing, interviewing and selection of prospective workers, recruitment agents are often expected to pay for their hotel and food expenses as well as provide them with ‘entertainment’ that can include prostitutes during their stay. Sometimes, these company representatives take the receipts from the recruitment agents and claim them from their company on their return. This gives them even more illicit income and provides a cover for the corruption they have engaged in (Jureidini, 2014). The source for all of these payments is the workers themselves. Thus, the amount of money that is required from migrant workers is far in excess of just service commissions of the recruiters (see Rajan et al., 2011; Jureidini, 2014). For example, in an exploratory study on recruitment in 2013, recruitment agencies interviewed in India varied in their responses to the question of how much they charged workers for recruitment costs, ranging from $500 to $1,500. For example, the Charishma Recruitment Agency (Kerala) said they charged a minimum of $500. This was to cover the cost of airfare, immigration clearance, medical testing, document attestation, visa charge and trade testing. This figure did not make sense, given the comparatively higher rates charged by other agencies. Presumably, in addition to these charges there would be an additional $500 as pure commission for the agency. For example, the Global Hunt recruitment agency (Delhi) charges labourers $1,562, comprising medical costs ($70), Visa and ticket cost ($383), Emigration Clearance Requirement ($56, but which should be $3) and $1,000 service charge (i.e. commission). The Qatar Manpower Agency (Delhi) charges workers between $800–$1,000; Shreenath Associates (Mumbai) charge $1,240 and Norka Roots agency (Trivandrum) charges $1,093. (Jureidini, 2014: 40) These payment requirements by agencies exceed the maximum service fee of Rs 20,000 (approximately $320) (or the equivalent of 45 days’

40  Ray Jureidini salary, whichever is less) that is mandated by the Indian Protector of Emigrants at the Ministry of Overseas Indian Affairs. The study found that according to the testimonies of recruitment agents, Indian workers were paying $1,300 on average, ranging from $1,093 to $1,562. In interviews with Indian construction workers in Qatar, no one knew what the payment was for. Two said it was for the airfare, one said it was the agency’s commission and the rest said they did not know. They did not ask, were not told and were not given receipts (ibid.). The most distressing part of the recruitment structure is that it is the poorest, low-skilled migrant workers who pay for their jobs. Skilled and professional workers normally pay nothing, although there are exceptions from some African countries (Jureidini, 2014). The desperation and thus vulnerability of low-skilled workers is exploited to the hilt, and they have no idea how the money they pay is corruptly disbursed. They merely accept it as what they have to pay to get the job. They are not told what it is all for and they are not given a receipt. They may also have to pay a subagent in the locale where they are recruited as well as the registered recruitment agency. Breeding’s study in 2010 of construction companies in Qatar and recruitment agencies in India stressed three ‘informal practices’ that ‘potentially undermine formal institutions and allow for abuses of contract brokering’. Most important is the relationship between registered recruitment agents in the main cities of India and their subagents, primarily in rural areas. These subagents have become increasingly important since the financial crisis from 2008 reduced the labour demand from Qatar and other Gulf states (putting some 30 per cent of recruitment agencies out of business); further, because of the rise of real wages in the Indian cities and the stagnation of wages in the Gulf, the normal source of migrant Indian labour has shifted to the poorer rural regions across India (and away from Kerala, where high levels of education, low fertility rate and higher relative wages have made the Gulf less and less attractive). The vulnerability of these rural, largely low-skilled and uneducated workers is the deception through the enticements of the subagents to get them to travel to the Gulf, without revealing the comparative benefits of internal migration to urban areas. The general manager of a large recruitment agency in Mumbai noted: ‘Slowly, slowly, earnings in India have been increasing. Workers don’t want to go to the Gulf, unless they live in a remote village and don’t know any better’ (Breeding, 2012; Jureidini, 2014: 61). In summary, corruption in the recruitment industry is systemic, beginning with the financial pressures on contractors and their subcontractors from the tendering phase to secure a project, the desperation

Systemic reform in migrant labour recruitment 41 of recruitment agencies to secure labour supply contracts and poor workers who are desperate to secure a job abroad by paying whatever is required. Workers’ payments unwittingly ‘feed’ the seduction of this corruption and ironically make them more vulnerable to debt bondage and forced labour. The lack of transparency and vested interests involved in these various levels of conspiracy has largely prevented capture and prosecution. Instead, over many decades, they have become part of the culture of labour recruitment in both origin and destination countries.

Visa trading Visa trading of ‘free visas’ is a major source of irregularity in Qatar, mainly by small- and medium-sized companies. Free visas are well known in the labour origin countries. They are not free in the monetary sense, but free of an employer or job. The critical question is whether the migrant worker knows that there is no actual job before departure. Irregular workers under these circumstances may or may not be victims of deception, fraud and possibly trafficking. When a contract for a construction project has been awarded, the contractor applies to the Department of Expatriates Affairs for a ‘block visa’ detailing all the personnel required according to gender, occupation and nationality. As the Qatar government operates a non-transparent policy of quotas according to nationality, the application for the block visa is invariably returned with amendments. Thus, companies routinely apply for much larger numbers of visas than is actually required. The company then has to ‘play’ with these in recruiting the personnel they actually want. The contract is in accordance with the visa but does not match with the letter of offer and actual job performed. This can be done without much resistance or concern by the employees. So an electrician will have a contract and visa as a plumber, but only where the salary is the same for both in accordance with the original demand letter. The actual conditions of employment are commensurate with the offer letter, not the contract. This is all a moral hazard resulting from the government’s policy. When the visas have been issued, the company then decides whether to actually hire or sell the visas to middlemen – in Qatar or in the origin countries. Sometimes, fake companies are registered simply to obtain and sell free visas. It has been suggested that the costs of these visas to Indian workers is from $1,500 to $2,000, the intermediary agent taking around $500. Workers who arrive with a free visa in Qatar will get a residency permit from their sponsor after 3 months but need to find proper work

42  Ray Jureidini within 12 months. They are also likely to be asked to pay for the residency permit, medical test and health card. After finding a proper employer, they will need a no-objection certificate (NOC) from their sponsor and are likely to be charged QAR 5,000 (US$1,370) for the NOC. Those demanding these payments will be middle managers, including human resources managers, and include both nationals and expats.

Required reforms The structural interconnectedness of the forces that lead to corruption throughout the demand for and supply of migrant workers as shown earlier means that reforms to migrant labour recruitment need to be systemic rather than piecemeal. It is true that individual employing companies in the destination countries can require that their labour supply agents not take money from workers they recruit – and have that built into their contractual arrangements. This is already occurring in Qatar. Motivations to do this come from genuine concerns about human and labour rights of migrant workers that they employ. Others are motivated by threats of prosecution under anti-bribery legislation and various international human and labour rights organizations that threaten the reputations of multinational and transnational corporations in construction and other industries. Fundamental to reform is transparency in the calls for project tenders and checks of the validity and bona fides of tendering companies. Transparency is required in the detailing of labour costs, particularly recruitment costs, perhaps in between the technical and commercial evaluation phases of the tenders. The lowest-cost bid for a project requires inquiry, rather than immediate acceptance, to ascertain if the lower costs include savings from recruitment and reliance upon worker payments. Transparency (or abolition) is required in public policies of nationality quotas for visa applications to prevent the mismatching of occupations and visas. On 2 December 2014, the Qatar Chamber of Commerce announced that there would be no more restrictions of nationalities requested by employers since the chamber had been given a seat on the Recruitment Committee at the Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs, which clears work visas for companies (The Peninsula, 2 December 2014); however, there is no evidence to date how far this has been implemented. Of critical importance in the reform of recruitment practice is the abolition of recruitment agents charging migrant workers. The widespread

Systemic reform in migrant labour recruitment 43 adoption of migrant worker welfare standards in Qatar mandates this, not just for Qatar but also for agencies in origin countries. The standards, however, are commercial in orientation and are not legally binding with legal sanctions. Nonetheless, there is evidence that multinational corporations are implementing ethical recruitment practices, where contracts with recruitment agencies specify that they will not charge workers anything. The employer will pay all recruitment costs. There are risks, however, that agents may still charge workers and make them promise, under threat, not to disclose that they have. Some agents go so far as to have workers on video saying they have not paid. Over the years it has become generally accepted that workers will or should pay these huge fees. Interestingly, the World Bank study did not recommend that recruitment agencies should not take money from migrant workers. They suggested that banks should be open to providing loans at lower interest rates and that the employer in Qatar deduct the debt from their salaries: Nepali authorities should encourage the development of commercially viable and sustainable non-collateral-based migration financing schemes, whereby banks lend migrants based on a collective repayment guarantee by their manpower agency which is repaid directly by the foreign employer through monthly deductions from the migrants’ salaries. (Endo and Afram, 2011: xiii) The current limitation of ethical recruitment is that there are not enough ethical agencies that are large enough and with the experience of recruiting large numbers of workers of diverse occupations, particularly for the construction sector. With the pressures of time to begin and complete construction projects, employing companies are not investing the time, resources and energy into establishing or converting their intermediaries into ethical recruitment practices. In an interview with a large construction firm in Qatar, it was pointed out that the problem lies in the pressure of project timelines to have workers on site. The company requires three elements from the recruitment agency: 1 Secure ethical procedures 2 Experience in selecting and testing skills in construction trades 3 Ability to produce the scale required (e.g. up to 1,500 workers) within one or two months It was made clear that the time factor requires that the company prioritize (2) and (3) to ensure that the workers for the project are supplied

44  Ray Jureidini in time. Thus, past use of agencies that can supply will be preferred in the absence of competent ethical agencies. A number of proposals have been discussed to establish an ethical recruitment accreditation programme to train and give credibility to agencies that are willing to provide migrant labour without charging them. Any accreditation programme, however, will eventually need government backing for broader legitimacy and in support of the labour law that prohibits workers paying recruitment fees and charges. At a broader level, the abolition of worker payments would be strengthened through bilateral relations between the Qatari state and the governments of origin countries, specifying that only workers who have not paid anything will be granted work visas. This has already taken place between Qatar and Nepal. In July 2015, an agreement between the Qatari and Nepalese ministers of labour was signed, where ‘Qatari employers are required to pay for everything – from visa fees to air fares of migrant workers’ (Rai, 2015). On the other hand, following an agreement between the two governments, workers recruited from Nepal to Qatar from the end of July 2015 should not have paid any recruitment costs, fees or charges. On 8 July 2015, the Kathmandu Post reported that ‘aspiring migrant workers will have to pay only for their health check-ups, orientation training and the migrant worker’s welfare fund’. There was some recognition that if the employer does not pay the recruiting agency, workers can pay up to a maximum of NR 10,000 (approximately US$100), compared with the usual NR 70,000 (US$660) or above. Of course, a more effective reform would be for all countries sending low-skilled workers to the Gulf to repeal all laws and regulations that allow recruitment agencies to charge migrant workers. This is important because over the decades and generations, it has become part of the culture of labour migration in both origin and destination countries that workers have to pay for the jobs they want. It has reached a point that workers are distrustful of any agency that will not charge them (Jureidini, 2014). Greater use of government rather than private recruitment agencies could also assist in the development of ethical recruitment. In India, for example, the Ministry of Overseas Indian Affairs has stipulated a maximum of approximately Rs 20,000 (US$320), but in reality, agencies charge three to four times that amount. In the study by Breeding (2012), the government-based recruitment agency in Goa charged only the approved rate and would deal only with employers who would pay all other costs. The indication is that public ethical principles are more likely to be abided by if government is involved in recruitment.

Systemic reform in migrant labour recruitment 45 The increasing use of electronic means of recruitment also holds out some hope to reduce corruption and the costs of intermediaries. For example, India’s Ministry of Overseas Indian Affairs has established an ‘e-Governance’, or ‘e-Migrate’, programme for greater levels of efficiency, transparency and accountability in the emigration system. . . . [automating] emigration clearance, registration and employers’ permits, dispense with discretion, mitigate harassment of emigrants and remove corruption. . . . interlinking with recruiting agents, employers, immigration counters, Indian Missions abroad, insurance companies and state governments, etc. (Interview with T.K. Manoj Kumar, Joint Secretary Ministry of Overseas Indian Affairs, Emigration Policy Division, May 2013) Finally, in Qatar, the possibility of unintended consequence of the recent implementation (3 November 2015) of the Wages Protection System will go a long way in eliminating visa trading of free visas. All companies must show bank transfers for the wages of all employees with visas under their sponsorship. Those who break the law by not employing the migrant workers they sponsor will be caught by the electronics payment system and be required to pay hefty fines and answer for their actions. Thus, many of these sponsors are currently reporting (falsely) that the workers have absconded in order to absolve themselves of any further responsibility. It remains to be seen over the coming months how the Ministry of Interior will deal with these arrangements.

Conclusion Governments of sending countries have an interest in workers paying recruitment agencies because the kickbacks they are used for are what drives the sourcing of labour. In the aggregate there is a net gain for workers and their families, and for foreign currency earnings from remittances. To stop them paying will reduce the bribery and extortion of and by employers, agencies and government officials in both origin and destination countries. But it may also mean a reorientation of sourcing – for more skilled workers and fewer numbers, and possibly from more developed countries. This may result in a comparative net loss for origin countries such as India, Pakistan, Nepal, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka, but more efficient and more ethical industries in destination countries, as well as decent work and conditions for those who

46  Ray Jureidini are employed. Human rights advocates might argue that reducing the numbers of migrant workers from poor countries will affect economic and social development and that it may be in the long-term interests of workers from the poorer countries to turn a blind eye to the corruption that actually creates the jobs for them. It is an issue that deserves more discussion.

References Amnesty International. 2013. The Dark Side of Migration: Spotlight on Qatar’s Construction Sector Ahead of the World Cup. London: Amnesty International. Breeding, M. 2012. ‘India-Persian Gulf Migration: Corruption and Capacity in Regulating Recruitment Agencies’, in Mehran Kamrava and Zahra Babar (eds), Migrant Labour in the Persian Gulf, London: Hurst and Company, pp. 137–154. Crepeau, Francois. ‘Report of the Special Rapporteur on the Human Rights of Migrants: Mission to Qatar’, United Nations Human Rights Council, Twenty-Sixth Session, 24 April 2014, Geneva. DLA Piper. 2014. Migrant Labour in the Construction Sector in the State of Qatar, Doha: DLA Piper. www.dlapiper.com. Accessed 24 May 2014. Endo, Esaku and Gabi Afram. 2011. The Qatar-Nepal Remittance Corridor: Enhancing the Impact and Integrity of Remittance Flows by Reducing Inefficiencies in the Migration Process. Washington, DC: World Bank. Human Rights Watch. 2012. Building a Better World Cup. New York: Human Rights Watch. International Labour Organization. 2013. Tricked and Trapped: Human Trafficking in the Middle East. Geneva: International Labour Organization. International Trade Union Confederation. 2014. ‘The Case against Qatar: Host of the FIFA World Cup’, ITUC Special Report. Jureidini, Ray. 2014. Migrant Labour Recruitment to Qatar: Report for Qatar Foundation Migrant Worker Welfare Initiative. Qatar: Bloomsbury/Qatar Foundation. Jureidini, Ray. (forthcoming). ‘Irregular Migration in Qatar: The Role of Legislation, Policies and Practices’, in Philippe Fargues and Nasra Shah (eds), Irregular Migration in the GCC States, Gulf Research Council, Cambridge University Press. Kovessy, P. and R. Sheble. 2015a. ‘Qatar Foundation Staff Arrested on Bribery Charges after Police Sting’, Doha News, 26 May 2015. http://dohanews. co/qatar-foundation-staff-arrested-on-bribery-charges-after-police-sting/. Accessed 25 July 2015. Kovessy, P. and R. Sheble. 2015b. ‘Court Convicts Two Qatar Foundation Employees of Soliciting Bribe’, Doha News, 30 June 2015. http://dohanews.co/ qatar-foundation-staff-convicted-of-soliciting-bribe-for-insurance-contract/. Accessed 25 July 2015.

Systemic reform in migrant labour recruitment 47 The Peninsula. 2014. ‘Chamber Says No Nationality Curbs on Visas’, 3 December 2014. http://thepeninsulaqatar.com/news/qatar/310000/chambersays-no-nationality-curbs-on-visas. Accessed 22 January 2015. Rai, Om Astha. 2015. ‘Zero Cost Migration, Really?’, Nepal Times, 8 April 2015. http://www.nepalitimes.com/blogs/thebrief/2015/04/08/zerocost-migration-really/. Accessed 8 April 2015. Rajan, S. Irudaya, V.J. Varghese and M.S. Jayakumar. 2011. Dreaming Mobility and Buying Vulnerability: Overseas Recruitment Practices in India. New Delhi: Routledge. Verité. 2013. Corruption and Labour Trafficking in Global Supply Chains, White Paper. https://www.verite.org/sites/default/files/images/WhitePaper CorruptionLabourTrafficking.pdf. Accessed 22 November 2014. World Bank. 2011. Guidelines Procurement of Goods, Works, and Nonconsulting Services. Washington: World Bank. http://siteresources.worldbank. org/INTPROCUREMENT/Resources/278019-1308067833011/Procure ment_GLs_English_Final_Jan2011.pdf. Accessed 5 October 2015.

4 Institutional strengthening of the offices of labour attachés of India in Gulf Field experiences from the United Arab Emirates and Qatar S. Irudaya Rajan and Arya Suresh This chapter brings out the findings of the Indian team as part of a larger study on the institutional strengthening of the offices of labour attachés of India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh under the auspices of The Migrating Out of Poverty Research Programme Consortium, based at the University of Sussex (Abrar et al., 2014). Based on a research conducted at the time of the global financial crisis, we placed the Indian migrant stock at 12 million in 2013 (Irudaya Rajan and Narayana, 2012). As of now, the Gulf region accounts for 6 million or 50 per cent of the Indian emigrants, with a majority of them in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, working in the construction, oil and natural gas, trading and financial sectors. Although a clear majority are low- and semi-skilled labourers, the presence of professional emigrants cannot be ignored. Over the years, the relevance of the Arab nations in shaping the economy of India has been proved beyond doubts. Remittances form the building blocks of the nation’s growth, which in reality is the sweat and blood of the Indians living abroad. In these circumstances, a study on the missions of the developing countries functioning in foreign lands is a necessity of the time, and it has been an eye-opener to the real issues facing the migrants and the challenges facing the authorities in addressing these issues. Creation of strong missions that can actively involve in the issues of labour is inevitable, and hence this study becomes relevant on social grounds.

Office of the labour attachés Labour attachés (LAs) are section officers who are by and large deployed in the Indian missions and consulates in the Middle East Asian countries (See Figure 4.1). Their most important duty is to

Strengthening of labour attachés in Gulf 49 represent the workers before the government of the host country. They have to keep the head of mission informed about developments affecting our labourers. Apart from these, they are responsible for registering the labourers, getting their grievances conveyed to the relevant authorities and extending the necessary support needed by them. The most serious responsibility of the LAs is the verification and attestation of the migrants’ documents. The need to use retired senior LAs for training and development purposes is a must but is not effectively done. The performance of each LA is reviewed by his superior officer. Another strong issue that faces LAs in the Gulf is that of undocumented migration. Undocumented migration is a major and multifaceted problem. Immigrants with genuine visas to begin with become undocumented if they overstay their visa period; if their sponsors file a suit charging them to be absconders; and if they run away from their genuine sponsors and enter the service of other sponsors, or moonlight their services. Others enter the country with no visa or use visas obtained by impersonation. Undocumented migration by Indian citizens to other countries occur mainly when people, duped by agents, travel on free visa. In no Gulf country is there free visa. However, when an immigrant either moonlights his services or works under different sponsors, he is said to be on a free visa. In reality, a so-called free visa is an open invitation to all, to exploit the immigrant concerned in any manner possible. The so-called free visa holders cannot do anything legally: they cannot open a bank account, cannot transfer money legally to any country or cannot get treated in a hospital. Every citizen of a Gulf country, who has land, business or industry, can get the permission from his or her government to recruit a fixed number of foreigners as his or her employees. To go to work in the Gulf without being under visa bondage to a specific citizen of that particular Gulf country is illegal. For instance, • •

When a person, who came on one person’s visa, escapes from his or her sponsor and goes to work for some other employer. Similarly, when a person goes into hiding after his or her employment with his sponsor ends.

Unfortunately, our system does not do enough to prevent undocumented migration, so it is mainly the Gulf governments that take action against our offenders. The usual term of office for LAs is three years. Usually the successor and predecessor are allowed to overlap for a few days to facilitate

50  S. Irudaya Rajan and Arya Suresh

Head of Mission [Ambassador or high commissioner/head of post (Consul General in key cities like Dubai, Jeddah) rank of senior joint secretary to GOI] Minister [in charge of commerce, economic relations, labour, etc., of the rank of joint secretary to GOI] Counsellor [of different departments, of the rank of director at MEA] First Secretary [of the rank of deputy secretary to GOI] Second Secretary [of the rank of undersecretary] Third Secretaries Figure 4.1  Hierarchy of officials at the Indian missions abroad Source: Author.

handing over and taking over of office files and for getting a concentrated briefing. Another relevant skill that an LA needs to possess is communication. Indian LAs work with Indian migrants from all parts of the country and hence come across different mother tongues where LAs’ language skills are put to the test. Language requirements change with the changing demographic nature of Indian expatriates. As against the usual perceptions, LAs do not involve in any sort of recruitment activities. They however keep closely monitoring local government regulations and reported abuses against Indian employees, and implement the government policy of enforcing certain conditions for recruiting in India. Offenders are warned, and if they persist, they are blacklisted. LAs used to be from the Ministry of External Affairs, and they report to their head of mission and to the head of division at MEA. Military attachés are of the rank of colonel and equal the rank of first secretaries. LAs equal the rank of attaché or section officer. Our enquiry into the quality of functioning of the office of LAs left us with the following suggestions regarding the improvement of its efficiency. The labour section needs to be staffed adequately so that the multifarious tasks can be done properly. • The section ought to be equipped with good data storage and communicating systems. • Although the LA, being a section officer, is not representational officer, the officer should be given adequate means to communicate and liaison with officers at the high level. •

Strengthening of labour attachés in Gulf 51

The field investigation Research methodology As part of the study, India chose UAE and Qatar as its fields of study from the Middle East. According to the World Bank (2011), the UAE registered the highest Indian migrant stock in the Middle East, with size as much as 2,185,919. Qatar on the other hand, with the FIFA World Cup football match on its cards, has witnessed an unprecedented inflow of foreign labour, mostly from the South Asian region. The researchers from India have made an extensive field study in both Qatar and the UAE and spoke to migrant Indian labour of all skill levels, recruitment agencies, civil society organisations, legal and administrative practitioners and LAs of Abu Dhabi, Dubai and Qatar. Table 4.1 provides the sample sizes of various organisations and individuals included in the study in both the UAE and Qatar.

General findings and responses from the field Qatar Qatar, with its boom in the construction field and economic development, has been a top destination for unskilled labour from South Asian nations. However, many Indians were of the opinion that the embassies of developing countries have their limitations in countries abroad, unlike those of the United States and the United Kingdom. This is why embassies mostly (especially Indian) confine themselves to mediocre issues like passport renewal and emigration processing and do not attempt heroic service postulates. Perhaps it is necessary to stress that an embassy, by its very nature, has no police powers. It is

Table 4.1  Sample size of organisations and individuals for the study

Migrant workers Labour attachés Civil society organisations Recruitment agencies Source: Author.

UAE

Qatar

Total

97 2 3

49 1 2

146 3 5

4

3

7

52  S. Irudaya Rajan and Arya Suresh created by a bilateral agreement to sort out problematic issues through negotiations and persuasion. In fact, no sovereign country will permit any other country to have an office or person from another country, armed with police powers, to be or to function from within its territory. To protect the rights and dignity of their citizens in foreign countries, nations depend entirely on the nobility of character of its representatives abroad. The offices of the developing nations also face high security threats due to the locations they are situated in. Most Indians in the Gulf are employed in unskilled jobs and have very limited knowledge of the laws of the territory and their rights and obligations. This makes them highly vulnerable and puppets in the hands of sponsors and agents. Most of them, in spite of their appalling living conditions, do not consider going back because they have large debts incurred for migration and going back will simply throw them into a vicious cycle of poverty and sufferings. Embassies mostly attempt to resolve employee issues through talks and arrive at amicable solutions, and it is not really a forceful legal authority. Among the South Asian population, Indians, Bangladeshis and Sri Lankans are the most sought after, for most of them understand Hindi and it is easier for the employers to communicate. Previously, there was a huge inflow of labour from Egypt, Uganda, Ghana, Vietnam and so on, which is now on a diminishing phase, for they are not manageable by the local employers due to their language issues. The labour camps now have a better shape, and the labour office (refers to the labour ministry of the host country) is very strict about its quality. Most labour camps are not concentration camps anymore, and it is a legal order that a room should not consist of more than four dwellers in it. But the high rent prevailing in the country sometimes makes it hard for the employers to provide the workers with facilities as suggested by the authorities. One can even see immense numbers of caravans (portacabins) which make labour camps. The people generally are of the opinion that the embassy functions are not that appreciably good, but they get things done for the sake of it. The major issues they raised included the late opening hours (9 a.m.), unlike the rest of the Qatari institutions that start functioning by 7 a.m. Moreover, the embassy is closed during Indian festivals and days like Gandhi Jayanthi and Dasara, which causes great difficulty. They mostly suggest that Indian offices too follow the Qatari timings and holidays for the convenience of people working there. However, what was found necessary and done was that the open day was strictly

Strengthening of labour attachés in Gulf 53 on Fridays and each one was announced by advertisements well in advance, both in Qatar and Bahrain. Major embassy functions pertain to certifications, police verifications, passport renewal and so on. Attestations of the migrant workers are now done in India, which is a process that consumes much time and effort. Moreover, the growth of certain lobbies that charge high amounts of money for helping the migrants get their attestations done is also a cause of worry. Advertisements of such agencies that take up attestation as their business even appear on newspapers, making them completely legal and fair. Incapability of the embassies leave migrants with no other option but to pay these agencies their prices and get things done this way. It would be fairer to say also that the tendency of our people to wait till the last moment leaves them only the costly alternative or getting these attended to by agencies. Sending countries should hence open attestation centres in all destination countries to make it easier for the mostly uneducated labour across the seas. There has also been widespread criticism of the responsibility with which the embassy handles its operations. Conducting open days for the migrant workers in destination countries aims at providing them a chance to communicate their grievances to the authorities and facilitate a platform where they can express their concerns, meet their fellow migrants and so on. The whole purpose of such events should be ensuring maximum participation, but here on the other hand, the convenience of those for whom it is aimed at is of least importance. It is also worth mentioning that the embassies of Pakistan, Nepal and other countries have already resorted to conducting their open days during holidays. The functioning of the Indian Cultural Centre (ICC), the official cultural centre for the country, is worth mentioning. The after-hours embassy counters at the Indian Cultural Centre (ICC) is a great blessing to the Indians working in Qatar, where they can get their works done without losing a working day. Indian Cultural and Arts Society (ICAS), Kerala Muslim Cultural Centre and so on are also Indian cultural organisations established by the various political parties rooted in India at Qatar. Their services have been hugely appreciated by the migrants. It needs to be mentioned that even today the Indian Embassy in Qatar does not offer its citizens the option of booking appointments online. Where time is money, spending hours and days in those neverending queues at the embassy is nothing less than a torture. In short, the embassy should be more considerate of the migrants and involve in their issues with more genuine concern.

54  S. Irudaya Rajan and Arya Suresh UAE UAE is a multicultured and multifaceted country that has ample opportunities for the workforce of any country. Its personnel policies regarding employment services are very much appreciable. Labour issues: the labour camps are monitored by the embassy, but not periodically. Surveys are conducted to understand the effectiveness of the functioning and maintenance of the labour camps. It was reported that due to the tight supervision of the embassy, now the workers residing in the camps receive better facilities and treatment. For instance, fresh vegetables are provided instead of frozen ones. The workers in the camps were also reported to have been given fruits every day according to the nominal costs of it. Quality of food is being taken care of with much caution. Visa issues: Employment visas, either direct or indirect depending on the category of workforce, are offered. Tourist visa is provided for 30 days during the Dubai Shopping Festival, which needs special mention. As the floating population in the country increases during the Dubai Shopping Festival, the exchange rate in the country also rises during this period. Transit visas are given only to promote travel and tourism in the country. According to the new rule, spouses can get visas only to the region where his or her husband or wife is put up and no other emirates. For residence visas medical insurance is made mandatory, the rates of which depending on the age of applicants tend to vary. Half the amount is borne by the embassy and the rest has to be borne by the applicants themselves. Emirates ID have now become mandatory for all people residing in the UAE. Labour ID arrangements are made by the sponsoring company, but in case of major accidents or other issues, the embassy takes over and sorts out issues for the migrants. The embassy is totally responsible for sending dead bodies to India, though this is often funded by the civil society bodies functioning in the destination countries. The UAE national system has rigid rules regarding visa policies and manpower supply services. This helps them maintain the flow of labour into their territory in an efficient manner. The UAE example proves beyond doubts that better the services of the employment system, the best the quality of the manpower. Hence, the successful functioning of the manpower system in UAE deserves appreciation in spite of its lapses. It is important that we also note that the migrant labour has reported ill-treatment in terms of physical and psychological elements. The embassy must observe a perfect system of database for the migrant workforce as it is mandatory while handling the workforce grievances.

Strengthening of labour attachés in Gulf 55 So a compulsory registration process is a must. It should also be noticed that the Philippine system works effectively in this regard.1 The salary given to the migrant labour sometimes is not on par with the standard salary fixed by the remuneration system of the country. Many of the women respondents have reported sexual harassment at the worksites and by the employers. Such issues are abundant, and hence, the relevance of a 24/7 hotline number and familiarising it to maximum number of people is a must. Women should be made aware of such facilities before they travel to the destination countries. This also calls for effective pre-departure trainings. It is reported that the embassy receives a minimum of 1,000 such calls every day. Another recent practice is that of providing exit passes to workers who do not have work permits. In the capital city of Abu Dhabi, embassy staff is inadequate to handle the grievances, but the general opinion is that in spite of these shortcomings the issues are well handled. The works at Dubai and Abu Dhabi are highly interrelated and can be handled mutually between both the emirates. Hence, the embassy and consulate activities can be made collaborative. The activities can also be collaborated with the civil society organisations of the country operation in the destination countries. The organisations also help reach facilities to people of all categories working in the Middle East. Anyhow, the funds allocated to these kinds of collaborative activities are highly insufficient. It should also be noted that there are almost 50 civil society organisations in the Gulf, but merely 8 are legally registered. To sum up, the overall performance of the embassy and the consulate is significantly efficient despite the shortcomings.

Concerns and grievances of migrant workers In both Qatar and the UAE, the major concern of the migrants has been reported to be non-payment of wages. In UAE 21 per cent have responded that they suffer non-payment of wages, 18 per cent reported denial of overtime and gratuity and 11 per cent reported excess work. The reasons behind such massive malpractices may be summarised as follows: When a person joins work without the necessary skills, but under false claims, the employer most often gives him or her a job far less fetching than the one mentioned in his or her visa. Since there are many Indian labourers who are unskilled and can for that reason alone be sent back, the employers feel quite safe to delay or even deny their wages.

56  S. Irudaya Rajan and Arya Suresh The supervisors (most often Indians) who actually distribute the wages are not always law abiding. Male supervisors make money on the side, by delaying the workers’ salaries and lending that money for high interest. If the loan goes bad, the workers’ salaries are denied. Indian on Indian crime is on the increase. The findings were more or less similar in Qatar as well. Twenty-five per cent reported no payment of wages, 19 per cent reported denial of overtime and gratuity and 10 per cent reported overload of work. These issues are mainly raised by those employed directly by the employees or by individuals. Though in most cases the contracts themselves contain clauses on the minimum wages and the facilities that would be provided in the destination countries, in reality they remain only on papers. However, one suggested solution was that if we were to have a system of compulsory registration of all emigrants, going abroad for employment, we could have copies of their contracts. The law courts in the Gulf would respect the copy as ample evidence of salaries due and ensure payment. In many cases, it is the ignorance of migrants that results in such mishaps. Knowing one’s rights and how to protect oneself will help survive much of the exploitation happening in the country. It should be kept in mind that Qatar and all the Gulf countries have very efficient and strict law-enforcing bodies which will help the migrants deal with these issues. The embassies of the labour-sending countries and in particular the LAs should also look into such issues with more interest, and strict actions should be taken against the employers and agencies exploiting the ignorant labourers. Although with clear evidence it is possible to get strict action against offending employers, the unscrupulous agents are usually influential people in India, with powerful backers. They are virtually untouchable. Improvements are possible only when we have certain values shared by everyone. Types of problems faced with governments and law-enforcing bodies Gulf countries are very well known for their strict and efficient lawenforcing agencies. With huge numbers of foreign nationals roaming around in their territories it is in fact a must that the country follow very strict legal order. In many cases, the migrants are absolutely ignorant of these laws and end up being penalised. As the UAE and the Gulf countries have made their national IDs compulsory, the most

Strengthening of labour attachés in Gulf 57 common problem was the one caused due to travelling without valid documents. Fifty per cent in the UAE and 52 per cent in Qatar have encountered problems with the local police for moving around without valid documents. Forty-eight per cent in both Qatar and the UAE have encountered the traffic police for violation of traffic laws. Nineteen per cent in the UAE and 12 per cent in Qatar have had issues with the labour courts for visa overstays. There have also been cases of theft, arrest based on sponsor’s (kafeel) false complaint and sent to detention centres, but these are rare cases. Types of issues faced with fellow Indians or migrants from other countries In circumstances where migrants of many nationalities are put together, many issues tend to arise which needs careful consideration. Issues mainly pertain to financial disputes (35 per cent in the UAE and 33 per cent in Qatar), theft (20.6 per cent in the UAE and 19.6 per cent in Qatar), temperament problems (30.9 per cent in the UAE and 29.9 per cent in Qatar) and some traces of deception and sexual harassments. The employers and the manpower agencies should take good care of such issues, which if left unsolved can be disastrous.2 Regular visits of LAs to labour camps and frequent interaction with workers can help sort these issues to a greater extent. Embassy’s response to these issues It was quite shocking to reveal that only 18 per cent of the Indians in the UAE and 15 per cent in Qatar have actually approached the embassy’s help to mitigate these issues. In the opinion of an Indian diplomat in the Gulf, Indians, who view government offices in India with distrust, do not feel attracted to visit the embassy till they are in deep trouble. The Open House system has done much to instil confidence in the embassy. However, keeping an Open Office every day meant more work. But it also meant greater satisfaction at being able to reach out to more and more people who are in need. But it is quite interesting to note that in the UAE 26.1 per cent women approached the embassy with their problems, while only 16.2 per cent men did. The main reason why the embassy was not approached at the time of distress is that the migrants did not trust the embassy in finding a solution to their grievances. In both the UAE and Qatar, 80 per cent of the respondents opined that the officials did not

58  S. Irudaya Rajan and Arya Suresh seriously address their issues. Another 20 per cent were of the opinion that they could not reach the right officials to whom their issue could be put across. The need for a simplified transparent mode of grievance redressal is a must to make missions more approachable to migrants.

Welfare functions of embassies Compared to other South Asian embassies, the Indian Embassy is much ahead in its diplomatic aspects and communication with civil society organisations and private sectors. Though the shortcomings in dealing with labour issues cannot be ignored, their positives on diplomatic sides cannot be understated either. It is also important that people know about the welfare functions of the embassy to make sure that they are best utilised. A total of 38.1 per cent of the people are aware of the registration that has to be done with the embassy, 68 per cent of the workplace inspections to be done, 7.2 per cent of the visits to detention centres, 60.8 per cent of the hotline numbers, 11.3 per cent of the public events, 5.2 per cent of the Open House programmes, 5.2 per cent of the provision of interpreters and 27.8 per cent regarding the legal assistance provided in courts. A total of 42.3 per cent were aware of the emergency rescue facilities, 18.6 per cent of the shelter homes, 9.3 per cent of employment assistance provided to abused workers, 30.9 per cent of the compensation facilities, 76.3 per cent of sending dead bodies home and 6.2 per cent of the premature repatriation services. This is quite an appreciable achievement. But it should also be noted that public events, Open House programmes and interpreter services need to be popularised more to ensure a better communication between the embassy and the migrants. Welfare functions of the missions   1 Authentication and verification of employment contracts   2 Attestation of documents pertaining to recruitment from India   3 Counselling and assistance to Indian workers in settling disputes related to work contracts   4 Assistance to workers in claiming legal dues relating to termination benefits   5 Registration of death of an Indian national   6 Assistance in follow-up work with sponsors and local authorities for the earliest burial/transportation to India of mortal remains   7 Issue of No Objection Certificate for the local burial or transportation to India of mortal remains of deceased Indian nationals

Strengthening of labour attachés in Gulf 59  8 Assistance to family members of Indian nationals in claiming death compensation due to accidental or other unnatural deaths  9 Attending the Shariah Court for the settlement of death compensation claims of deceased Indian nationals who authorise the embassy with their power of attorney 10 Realisation of death compensation claims from Qatari authorities and repatriation of the same to India to the next of kin of deceased Indian nationals, through district authorities 11 Assistance for taking up problems of a personal nature back home, of the Indian nationals in Qatar, with the authorities concerned in India for redress

Positive practices of the Indian mission Indian Community Welfare Fund (ICWF) Ministry of Overseas Indian Affairs has established the Indian Community Welfare Fund (ICWF) in the 17 Emigration Clearance Required countries in 2009, extending to 24 countries in 2010 and the remaining 157 countries in 2011.3 The ICWF is aimed at providing ‘on-site’ welfare services on a means-tested basis in the most deserving cases, including:  i boarding and lodging for distressed overseas Indian workers in household/domestic sectors and unskilled labourers;   ii extending emergency medical care to the overseas Indians in need; iii providing air passage to stranded overseas Indians in need; iv providing initial legal assistance to the overseas Indians in deserving cases;   v Meeting the expenditure on incidentals and for airlifting the mortal remains to India or local cremation/burial of the deceased overseas Indian in such cases where a sponsor is unable or unwilling to do so as per the contract and the family is unable to meet the cost. Overseas Indian workers duped by unscrupulous intermediaries in the host countries, runaway housemaids, those who become victims of accidents, deserted spouses of overseas Indians or undocumented overseas Indian workers in need of emergency assistance or any other overseas Indian citizens who are in distress would be the main beneficiaries of the fund. The fund will also be utilised to meet the expenditure for airlifting the mortal remains of overseas Indian citizens to India on a meanstested basis, on the recommendation of respective heads of missions.

60  S. Irudaya Rajan and Arya Suresh The ICWF would be funded through budgetary support from the Ministry of Overseas Indian Affairs, funds raised by the Indian missions by levying a nominal service charge on consular services and voluntary contributions from the Indian community. Currently, the fund is administered by the following heads of missions to provide various on-site welfare services to the Indian citizens who are in dire distress. Apart from the ICWF, another valuable source of relief for the lowpaid workers has been the legal aid by Indian lawyers. Some of them like Advocate Nizar Kocherry in Doha have served the needy in our community by providing legal assistance free of fees. It is a sad comment on our system that we have not given any recognition to their service. Open House programmes The Indian Embassy conducts monthly Open House programmes. The monthly Open House addresses urgent consular and labour issues/ cases of Indian nationals in the state of Qatar. The ambassador and other officials meet all the complainants and discuss their problems, and the embassy actively follows up their cases with the authorities concerned in the governments of destination countries. Open Houses are also conducted by the ICCs on various issues pertaining to national and international relevance. For instance, the Qatari ICC conducted an Open House in connection with the 2014 General Elections in India so that the Indian citizens, though outside the national territory, can actively take part in the discussions and feel the heat of the situation at their convenience. In short, the Open Houses not only are venues for grievance redressal but also become an active platform that facilitates diaspora networking and social gathering. 24/7 Hotlines Another appreciable initiative of the Indian Embassy has been the introduction of a full-time hotline number, on which the Indians can reach the embassy at any time of the day. The study has clearly revealed that a lion’s share of people also have good knowledge about this scheme, which tells us that it is already popular among them. Decentralised embassy functions The embassy has also successfully delegated its functions among several official bodies so that the ultimate aim of maximum accessibility is ensured. The ICC is the official body of the Indian expatriate

Strengthening of labour attachés in Gulf 61 community functioning under the patronage of the embassy of India for the purpose of advancement of sports and social and cultural activities of the Indian community in Qatar. ICC is also the platform to serve the interest of more than 600,000 Indians residing in Qatar. The proclaimed objective of ICC includes promoting the rich Indian culture among the expatriates of all nationalities living in Qatar. Further, ICC is committed to function as a body of Indian Embassy to strengthen the deep-rooted Indo-Qatar friendship and cultural relationship. Moreover, the ICC has an after office-hours outlet of the embassy functioning in it, where the migrants can get their official works done without losing a day. The Indian Overseas Workers Resource Centre and Indian Community Benevolent Forum are also embassy-backed agencies that actively involve in taking the embassy’s missions to the greater masses.

Conclusion The India-Gulf migration is an evergreen theme that has been extensively studied by academics across the world. Every changing scenario at the socio-political front pertaining to migrating has its repercussions felt in India, and such is the role of migration in the growth and sustenance of this nation. The trends also highlight the enormous flow of unskilled labour beyond the borders, who are invariably the most socially and economically backward of the country’s population. Moreover, their lack of education and ignorance makes them vulnerable to exploitations in foreign lands. For nations like India with immensely huge expatriate populations, the missions and the offices of LAs are very substantial. They form the link between the ordinary workers and the government of the country. Protecting their rights and saving them from dismay are the prime obligations of missions of nations anywhere in the world. The field survey has brought out many issues that need discussion and rectification. Though the missions have their functions well written down and publicised, it needs to be evaluated as to how many people actually benefit from these services. In both countries studied, the accessibility to mission services is a glaring issue. The migrants finding the right official at the right time is equivalent to providing the right justice. Overcrowded, irresponsible missions will only make life harder for the expatriates. The office of the LAs is very much significant in addressing the problems faced by the migrant workers and hence needs to be made more stronger, independent and evaluated constantly. Enriching LAs with better training, utilising the services of retired officials and conducting

62  S. Irudaya Rajan and Arya Suresh more open days and communicative programmes are very much recommended. Though the missions in Qatar and the UAE have come up with innovative new attempts, a friendlier platform that creates easy and smooth communication between the workers and the missions is more important. We need to train a special category of officers, with an inborn sensitivity towards our people in need. Surely with all the modern techniques for personality analysis, it is eminently possible. If we are ever going to be a citizen-friendly nation, it is also absolutely necessary. LAs and officers at higher levels dealing with labour issues, both in our missions and in Delhi, could then be from that group of devoted and trained personnel.

Notes 1 There is the Philippine Overseas Workers Welfare Association (OWWA); every Philippine citizen, who goes abroad, has to register and pay a certain amount towards insurance and for protection against loss of jobs, towards lawyer’s fees in case of some case and so on. The amount is not large, but the fund is quite huge because of the several million people who pay. The OWWA has an office in each country where there are Filipino/a workers. While the embassy handles the labour issues with the government, the OWWA provides the immediate necessities to the affected. 2 The presence of considerable number of money lenders, liquor and narcotic pushers and pimps among the Indian inmates of camps also accounts for the alarming rise in crime. 3 In all Gulf countries, funds for the welfare of needy members of our community, especially low-paid men and women workers, were formed by our communities themselves. What the Ministry of Overseas Indian Affairs did was to supplement these funds with budgetary support, after the funds were in operation for a decade or more.

References Abrar, C.R., S. Irudaya Rajan, L.K. Ruhunage and Tasneem Siddiqui. 2014. ‘Institutional Strengthening of the Office of Labour Attaché: Research Findings from Bangladesh, India and Sri Lanka’, Working Paper No. 23, Migration Out of Poverty, University of Sussex. Irudaya Rajan, S. and D. Narayana. 2012. ‘The Financial Crisis in the Gulf and Its Impact on South Asian Migration and Remittances’, Chapter 5, in S. Irudaya Rajan (ed.), Global Financial Crisis, Migration and Remittances: India Migration Report 2012, New Delhi: Routledge, pp. 74–93. World Bank. 2011. Migration and Remittances Fact Book. Washington: The World Bank.

5 Contemporary Indian labour migration in the GCC region Emerging challenges and opportunities George S. Naufal, Froilan T. Malit Jr and Ismail H. Genc In the contemporary world, Indian migration (mostly high-skilled and family reunification immigration) has always been an integral part of the American and European immigration systems. These high-income countries often admit mostly high-skilled Indian workers by offering long-term social and economic benefits, including access to citizenship and work to attract these professional workers (Ruhs and Anderson, 2010). According to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), India is one of the two top sources of origin countries (apart from the Philippines) of highly skilled migrants that provide critical contribution to the destination countries’ economic growth and development (OECD, 2011). In the United Kingdom, for example, India was the top migrant-sending country in 2013 by country of birth (almost 10 per cent of all foreign-born in the United Kingdom came from India).1 India also ranked second in the total share of foreign-born in the United States only behind Mexico (Migration Policy Institute, 2013). Among Indian professionals, 70 per cent of those who left India in 2014 moved to one of the following highincome countries, Australia, Canada, United Arab Emirates (UAE), the United Kingdom and the United States (Murthy, 2015). These particular demographic trends and distributions signify both strong presence and contribution and their growing preference to migrate to high-income countries for better socio-economic opportunities. In contrast, the academic literature on Indian migrants in the Gulf region has been relatively little, yet the region has historically been a migrant destination through trading and other religious purposes (Vora, 2011). The Gulf region is the largest concentration of Indian migrants of all skill levels and is ranked as the third migration

64  Naufal, Malit and Genc destination in the world after North America and Europe (Adams, 2009). There are several factors that shape the region as a top destination for foreign workers. First, the Gulf region is wealthy with hydrocarbon resources but lacks local population (with the exception of Saudi Arabia) necessary to build or manage economic development and infrastructures. In the early 1980s, the total population in the Gulf region (including foreign workers) was less than 15 million spread out on an area, which is roughly estimated one-third of US land size (Naufal, 2015). The local GCC population had also limited human capital supply, and therefore when the GCC government embarked on ambitious infrastructure development projects, it had to import foreign migrants at almost every skill level to address the labour shortage (Naufal and Genc, 2012). The initial wave of foreign workers after the oil embargo in the early 1970s originated from neighbouring non-GCC Arab countries. In fact, the close proximity as well as the common language, religion and culture made them strongly preferred in the GCC market. However, few years later, the GCC countries replaced Arab foreign workers with South Asian workers after the 1991 Gulf War due to various pan-Arab ideologies and political protests that directly posed threats to the Gulf governments (Kapiszewski, 2001). This labour replacement benefited the South Asian countries – mostly India and Pakistan – that acted as main providers for unskilled workers for the construction sector (Naufal, 2015). The current share of Asian workers in the labour force in several of the GCC countries (Bahrain, Oman and the UAE) has crossed 80 per cent and is expected to increase given the new socio-economic developments in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region. To summarize, the Gulf region developed into one of the top destinations for migration. The question that comes to mind is, how important is the Gulf region for current and future Indian migrants? In the subsequent sections, we discuss the position of the GCC countries with respect to Indian’s migration, emerging opportunities and existing challenges faced by current and prospective Indian migrants in the Gulf region.

The Gulf region – top destination for Indian migrants Indian migrants dominate the largest group of foreign workers in every Gulf country (Naufal, 2015). For instance, Indian workers comprised the largest share of residency visas in Kuwait in 2011, while Indian expatriates currently constitute almost 50 per cent of all foreign workers in the private sector in Oman. In 2014, Indian migrants had

Labour migration in the GCC region 65 the largest share of migrants in the UAE, totalling nearly 3.1 million (excluding undocumented cases) (Migration Policy Institute, 2013). In addition, almost 30 per cent of all professionals who moved to the UAE came from India, the largest among all labour-sending countries (Murthy, 2015). Figure 5.1 shows the share of Indian migrants using bilateral data for 2010 and 2013. For both years, the GCC countries outranked other main destinations with at least 43 per cent of Indian migrant stocks living in the Gulf, twice the share of those living in Australia, Canada, the United Kingdom and the United States combined. Furthermore, the share of Indian migrants in the Gulf increased from 43 to 46 per cent between 2010 and 2013, and is expected to further grow given the increasing employers’ labour demand in all sectors in the Gulf region. That said, Figure 5.1 ranks the GCC countries as the top destinations for Indian migrants of all skill levels. However, the nature of Gulf migration is fundamentally different from that of other mainstream destinations for several reasons. For example, Gulf migration is temporary by nature (even if foreign expatriates often stay for decades at a time), and local citizenship is severely restricted for foreigners. It is also true for the investment in the local real estate market (Gardner, 2011). Family reunification is limited (and depends on the expatriate’s monthly salary), therefore influencing Indian migrants (and others) to remit a large portion of the workers’ earnings to secure their future migratory decisions (whether going back to India or moving on to a more permanent migration destination). Figure 5.2 presents remittance inflows to India by source of money between 2010 and 2014 across three major groups of countries: GCC countries as one group, Australia, Canada, the United Kingdom and the United States as another and the other group which includes countries outside the 2013

2010

30%

27%

43%

GCC AU/CA/UK/US Other

27%

46%

27%

Figure 5.1  Share of Indian migrants by destination Source: Authors’ calculations based on Ratha and Shaw (2007).

GCC AU/CA/UK/US Other

66  Naufal, Malit and Genc 40,000 35,000

USD m on

30,000 25,000 20,000

GCC

15,000

AU/CA/UK/US Other

10,000 5,000 0 2010

2011

2012

2013

2014

Year

Figure 5.2  Remittance inflows to India by source of money Source: Authors’ calculations based on Ratha and Shaw (2007). 100% 20%

20%

28%

28%

47%

53%

53%

2012

2013

2014

22%

22%

22%

31%

30%

30%

47%

47%

2010

2011

80% 60% 40% 20% 0% GCC

AU/CA/UK/US

Other

Figure 5.3  Share of remittance inflows to India by source of money Source: Authors’ calculations based on Ratha and Shaw (2007).

first two groups. Figure 5.3 shows the share of remittance inflows to India by the source of money using the same grouping. Figures 5.2 and 5.3 highlight the importance of the Gulf region in terms of source of money to India. In 2014, for instance, more than

Labour migration in the GCC region 67 US$35 billion of remittance to India came from the Gulf, accounting for more than half of all the remittance inflows. Remittances from the Gulf region have steadily increased since 2010, while money from other destinations have decreased in 2012 and have not fully recovered since then. The share of remittances from the Gulf region also increased between 2010 and 2014, while the share of money transfers from non-GCC countries partly declined. The Gulf region is a critical economic destination for Indians migrants, comprising the largest share of the Gulf labour force. Remittance inflows from the Gulf are more than half of the total remittance flows to India, highlighting its significant economic contribution to migrant country’s long-term economic growth and development. The next section discusses some of the current challenges and opportunities that Indian workers face in the Gulf.

Challenges While the Indian migration inflows into the Gulf region have steadily increased over the past few decades, various state-led challenges have also been identified. First, the development of local human capital (known as ‘localization’ or ‘Gulfization’ in the labour force) poses a direct challenge to Indian migration and all other migrants – particularly high skilled – in the Gulf markets. In fact, direct investment of GCC governments in education and training of both male and female locals has increasingly enabled them to compete equally in the Gulf labour markets, often creating a state-led quota system that favours local Gulf nationals over other migrant nationalities during the employment hiring stage (Forstenlechner et al., 2012). These government-led initiatives are vigorously aimed not only at replacing foreign workers in different fields, specifically in the private sector, but also at reducing unemployment among local populations and creating sustainable labour markets (Alsheikh, 2015). While these Gulf governmentsled programmes have not fully achieved all their stated policy objectives, they still raise critical challenges for migrants – particularly high skilled – in securing long-term employment opportunities in the private sector. While these plans are long term, one has to wonder about the future demand of foreign workers in the region. Second, the fluctuating price of oil is another major concern that also affects the Indian and all expatriate communities in the Gulf region. While this challenge is not a new phenomenon, it has recently developed due to the emergence of shale oil and also the signed deal between Iran and the six major powers that brings expectations of an increase in the supply of oil due to the introduction of Iranian oil to

68  Naufal, Malit and Genc international markets. Low long-term oil prices greatly affect oil revenues for the GCC countries, which creates budget deficits and affects short-term and long-term construction projects in the region. The repercussions of the latest drop in oil prices are yet to be seen; however, several of the GCC countries have increasingly considered introducing a tax on remittance outflows as part of a wider economic strategy to cut spending and raise revenues both in the short and long run (Malit and Naufal, 2016). Given the current economic trend in the Gulf region, it is widely expected that the oil prices will most likely remain low for the next few years (if not decade), suggesting a permanent shift in GCC countries’ expenditure policies in the long run. Given the short-term nature of the Gulf region migration, taxing remittance outflows could significantly affect the attractiveness of the GCC countries to foreign workers. The potential size and magnitude of the effect is difficult to ascertain, given the likely reaction of remitters to avoid paying the fee by using unofficial methods of remitting (through friends and family and also through the strong Hawala system in the region). Still, any change to the amount of remittances sent by Indians could have significant effects on the receiving end. For instance, almost 90 per cent of emigration from Kerala is towards the GCC countries (Zachariah and Rajan, 2015). Historically, Kerala’s local economy is heavily supported by remittance inflows from the Gulf region. Any long-term changes to remittance flows would have significant effects on the receiving communities back in India. As the GCC countries diversify their economies and expand non-oil sectors, the Gulf region will experience a different demand for labour. With its modernized facilities in different sectors, academic, health, hospitality, sports and transportation, the GCC countries now routinely attract some of the best talents from Western countries. The 2008–9 financial crisis left many Western countries suffering from high unemployment rate, pushing many to seriously consider the Gulf as viable long-term career moves. That said, the Gulf labour market attracts talent from almost every corner of the world, adding critical economic pressures on Indian workers in the Gulf labour market, who have no alternatives but to directly compete with high-skilled expatriates from North America, Europe, Australia and Africa. Apart from the economic competition embedded in the Gulf markets, minimum wage has also been a long-standing issue between the Gulf and Indian governments. For example, the Gulf governments have no federal minimum wage law, and minimum wage is largely determined by the private-sector employers. Because of this legal condition in the Gulf countries, the Indian government has fiercely pushed

Labour migration in the GCC region 69 various dialogues to establish and enforce a minimum wage as a form of labour protection for its Indian migrant populations in the Gulf countries. However, all Gulf countries have not directly responded to the Indian government’s demand, and this has generated not only critical contention between India and Gulf governments but also an ongoing dilemma that has continued to shape their diplomatic relations over the past decade. The ongoing unethical or illegal recruitment conducted by recruitment agents (or subagents) is another important challenge faced by the Gulf, Indian governments and migrant workers. For example, excessive charging of fees on workers, along with contract substitution, does not only raise important regulatory concerns for Indian migrants but also harm the efforts of both Indian and Gulf governments in securing labour rights under major International Labour Organization conventions. Existing reports from various rights-based organizations negatively highlight the ongoing labour violations committed by employers, including but not limited to non-payment of wages, squalid accommodation, lack of judicial access, no overtime pay and long hours of work, and further validate the critical governance challenges in securing full labour protection measures for unskilled Indian migrants in the Gulf countries, particularly in construction-related industries. These do not only shape the current legal and diplomatic concerns of Gulf and Indian governments but also highlight ongoing limited coordinated efforts between government parties in addressing labour violations committed in the labour markets.

Opportunities Since the discovery of the hydrocarbon resources and their independence in the 1970s, the GCC countries have embarked on ambitious development plans to build world-class infrastructure (highways, airports, sea ports, universities, hospitals, etc.). The GCC governments have even expanded these projects since the 2000s, with plans to host the Dubai Expo 2020 and the World Cup 2022 in Qatar. The preparations for those events are well under way with tremendous construction sites in Dubai and Doha (roads, train stations, hotels, stadiums, etc.). These sites offer job opportunities for the next decade for construction workers from South Asia, specifically India. Events of such magnitudes also create jobs at different levels of skill, not just construction jobs. The jobs created would include maintenance, services, financials and health care. Indian professionals will benefit from such opportunities for several years to come. While one would expect

70  Naufal, Malit and Genc tremendous competition in the labour market, Indian workers will not have to worry about competition from non-GCC Arab workers. The GCC countries have been replacing Arab expatriates with workers from South Asian countries since the late 1980s and early 1990s. With the latest events in the Middle East, South Asian workers (and other regions) are simply preferred to Arab expatriates. Due to the nature of Gulf migration, remittance inflows play a major role in deciding whether to move to the GCC countries. The cost of transferring money is crucial for many workers, who often send money on several occasions during the year (monthly stipends to their families back home, family events, health emergencies and tuition payments). Figures 5.4a and 5.4b show the average cost of the transaction in percentage between 2011 and 2015 (first two quarters) from the Gulf countries and from the West to India (for sending US$200). The Gulf countries include Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the UAE. The West is represented by Australia, Canada, the United Kingdom and the United States. Figure 5.4a is limited to money transferred via banks, while Figure 5.4b shows the cost of remitting through money transfer operators. Several aspects attract our attention in Figures 5.4a and 5.4b. It is cheaper to remit to India from the Gulf than from Western countries regardless of the method. This is most likely due to the existence in the Gulf of a more established network of banks and money transfer operators which specialize in remittances than other countries, including Western countries.

10% 8% 6% 4% 2% 0% 2011

2012

2013 Gulf

2014

2015

West

Figure 5.4a  Average cost of remitting via banks to India in percentages Source: World Bank Online Database.

Labour migration in the GCC region 71 8% 6% 4% 2% 0% 2011

2012

2013 Gulf

2014

2015

West

Figure 5.4b Average cost of remitting via money transfer operators to India in percentages Source: World Bank Online Database.

Second, the cost of remitting via banks is declining in the Gulf, while it is stable in Western countries. Finally, it is more expensive to remit using banks relative to money transfer operators regardless of the sending region. The average cost of remitting via banks for the period between 2011 and 2015 is 6.6 per cent, while that number is 5.4 per cent via money transfer operators. For the thousands of construction workers from India living in the Gulf, lower transaction costs of remitting are good news given their low monthly wages. For professional Indian workers who are contemplating moving to the GCC countries, this could also help shape the region’s attractiveness. Recent labour reforms have been initiated by the Gulf countries aimed to protect the labour rights of workers and increase economic opportunities, productivity and mobility in the long run. For example, the Qatari government reformed its Kafala Sponsorship Laws eliminating an employer-determined exit permit, a policy that many rights-based organizations deemed to shift heavy employer control on workers’ mobility. However, given the new policy reform, a new government-led institution will be in place that will determine the plausibility of workers’ request for an exit permit. The potential problem with this reform is that it shifts the control from employer to government, therefore creating only cosmetic legal reforms that partially tackle the labour violations that permeate the Qatari market. On the

72  Naufal, Malit and Genc other hand, the UAE government has also passed several ministerial resolutions, which focus on workers’ right to switch employers based on income levels and recruitment. The initiatives aimed at protecting workers at the origin country by tackling contract substitution and asymmetric information between employer and employee. The initiatives also particularly address issues of unethical recruitment initiated by recruitment agents/subagents or brokers that facilitate the migration process for Indian migrants at the origin countries. Although international organizations have welcomed the UAE government’s efforts to improve the recruitment process for workers, one has to wonder about the potential outcomes of these state reforms on recruitment agents’/brokers’ recruiting behaviour at origin countries in the long run. Regardless of the outcome, any change to labour laws have significant and direct effects on the foreign population in the Gulf, which also could shape migration patterns to the region for decades to come. Apart from these legal labour reforms, the Gulf governments, particularly the UAE and Kuwait, have also launched pilot projects to recognize certification and upskill workers in the origin country destinations. These government pilot projects aim not only to create a comprehensive training and certification system that enables workers to obtain recognized skills and certification but also to improve their productivity through training, certification and mobility in the long run. While these government pilot projects are still at the initial stages of implementation, it is assumed that if these initiatives work effectively they can have a positive effect on Indian workers’ economic opportunities in the long run. Given these prevailing labour reforms and initiatives, the Gulf governments seem to have increasingly important measures to tackle critical labour policy issues affecting migrant populations, particularly Indian migrant workers, while simultaneously providing long-term viable economic opportunities. In addition, these particular government efforts are inherently aimed not only to address recruitment violations but also to increase productivity, mobility and opportunities for migrant workers. While no prevailing empirical or policy studies have assessed these government regulatory reforms, it is assumed that these initiatives will address recruitment violation issues and provide the necessary labour regulation measures to effectively manage the labour flows from origin countries (particularly India) to the Gulf countries, offering tremendous future opportunities to thousands of Indian workers.

Labour migration in the GCC region 73

Conclusion India is one of the largest countries in the world in terms of population. In several of the main migration destinations, Indian migrants do not just constitute the largest presence in numbers, but also they are the biggest share in the labour force among all foreigners. India also views the Gulf region as an important economic institution due to Indian migrants’ large share of remittances and its abilities to help guide and fund development projects in Indian communities. As the Gulf region shaped itself as one of the top destinations for migrants, including Indian workers, one wonders about the challenges and opportunities that the GCC countries offer Indian expatriates. As the Gulf countries continue to recruit more workers, coordination will become a critical issue to manage various policy and regulatory concerns, particularly minimum wage, unethical recruitment and other contract-related rights of Indian migrants, particularly unskilled workers in the construction sector.

Note 1 India was second in the share of all foreign citizens at 7 per cent behind Poland. For more information, see Rienzo and Vargas-Silva (2014).

References Adams, Richard. 2009. ‘The Determinants of International Remittances in Developing Countries’, World Development 37(1): 93–103. Alsheikh, Hend. 2015. ‘Current Progress in the Nationalization Programmes in Saudi Arabia’, GLMM Explanatory Note 02. http://cadmus.eui.eu/bit stream/handle/1814/34580/GLMM_ExpNote_02_2015.pdf?sequence=1. Accessed 10 November 2015. Forstenlechner, Ingo, Mohamed Madi, Hassan Selim and Emilie Rutlege. 2012. ‘Emiratization Determining the Factors That Influence the Recruitment Decisions of Employers in the UAE’, The International Journal of Human Resource Management 23(2): 406–421. Gardner, Andrew. 2011. ‘Gulf Migration and the Family’, Journal of Arabian Studies 1(1): 3–25. Kapiszewski, A. 2001. Nationals and Expatriates: Population and Labour Dilemmas of the Gulf Cooperation Council States. Reading, UK: Ithaca Press. Malit, Jr. Froilan and George Naufal. 2016. Taxing Remittances: Consequences for Migrant Labor Populations in the GCC Countries. Gulf Labor Markets and Migration – An Explanatory Note, No. 1/2016, pp. 1–16. Gulf Labour Markets and Migration.

74  Naufal, Malit and Genc Migration Policy Institute. 2013. ‘State Immigration Data Profiles’. http:// www.migrationpolicy.org/data/state-profiles/state/demographics/US. Accessed 29 October 2015. Murthy, Soha. 2015. ‘The Top 20 Countries where Professionals Are Moving for Work Based on LinkedIn Data’, LinkedIn Official Blog, 11 August. http:// blog.linkedin.com/2015/08/11/the-top-20-countries-where-professionalsare-moving-for-work-based-on-linkedin-data/. Accessed 29 October 2015. Naufal, G. 2015. ‘The Economics of Migration in the Gulf Cooperation Council Countries’, in Barry R. Chiswick and Paul W. Miller (eds), Handbook of the Economics of International Migration, Amsterdam: Elsevier, pp. 1597–1640. Naufal, G. and Ismail Genc. 2012. Expats and the Labour Force: The Story of the Gulf Cooperation Council Countries. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. OECD. 2011. International Migration Outlook 2011. Paris: OECD. Ratha, Dilip and William Shaw. 2007. ‘South-South Migration and Remittances’, World Bank Paper No. 102. Rienzo, Cinzia and Carlos Vargas-Silva. 2014. ‘Migrants in the UK: An Overview’, Migration Observatory Briefing, COMPAS, University of Oxford. Ruhs, M. and Bridget Anderson. 2010. Who Needs Migrant Workers?: Labour Shortages, Immigration, and Public Policy. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Vora, Nera. 2011. ‘Unofficial Citizens: Indian Businessmen and the StateEffect in Dubai, UAE’, International Labour and Working Class History 79(1): 122–139. Zachariah, K.C. and S. Irudaya Rajan. 2015. ‘Dynamics of Emigration and Remittances in Kerala: Results from the Kerala Migration Survey 2014’, Working Paper No. 463, Centre for Development Studies.

6 Working and living conditions of migrant workers in the GCC Abdoulaye Diop, Kien Trung Le and Michael C. Ewers Since Qatar was awarded the hosting of the 2022 World Cup, a great deal of media attention has focused on the conditions of the foreign workers responsible for creating and maintaining the infrastructure of the modern Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC)1 states. Some have questioned the Kafala system of foreign labour recruitment and local sponsorship in the Gulf, asking whether this system indeed represents modern indentured servitude (Shaheen and Gibson, 2015). Others have criticized the occupational health and safety of migrant workers in the Gulf, in response to the growing number of construction worker deaths in the region (Booth, 2013). Finally, the labour camps in which these workers live have come under criticism from the international media, especially after two BBC reporters were jailed in Qatar for investigating the conditions of these camps (Lobel, 2015). Yet, while a number of questions have been raised and an abundance of speculation has followed, we remain short on reliable empirical data as to the actual working and living conditions of migrant workers in the GCC (Gardner et al., 2013). This chapter seeks to make some progress in filling this gap by focusing on the views and words of the migrants themselves, and responding to questions on their economic and social welfare, attitudes towards work and their employers and relationship with the broader communities in which they live. The basis of this chapter is a nationally representative survey of migrant workers in the GCC countries conducted in 2012 by the Social and Economic Survey Research Institute at Qatar University. This survey, which is the first of its kind in the region, provides an informational baseline for blue-collar workers in the GCC. For this project, we surveyed over 3,600 migrants distributed across five of the six GCC countries – Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar and Saudi Arabia (KSA). Participants were asked about their attitudes towards their living and working conditions, in addition to their communications

76  Diop, Kien and Ewers with family members in their home countries. The results of the survey illustrate variation in blue-collar workers’ challenges and difficulties across the GCC, despite being under similar immigration systems.

Gulf development context and survey methodology Foreign workers represent vital tools for the GCC states to achieve their rapid economic growth and development over the past half century, providing the labour and the skills needed for oil production and infrastructure construction. Initially, migration labourers were seen as supplementing the small, local populations of the Gulf. Over time, however, foreign workers emerged as the majority of the total labour force and the total population across all six Gulf countries. The result has been economic development but also tremendous demographic changes. Qatar and the UAE exemplify this issue as non-citizens represent more than 85 per cent of the total population and more than 90 per cent of the workforce (De Bel-Air, 2014, 2015). Despite the fact that blue-collar migrant workers represent a large component of all foreign workers in these countries, little is known about them. Moreover, with no prospect of ever becoming citizens of these countries, and thus no access to the benefits and protections of citizenship (Babar, 2014), it is important for us to examine their living and working conditions. The data analysed and described in this report is based on the 2012 Labour Camp Survey conducted in the GCC countries. We collected 709 completed surveys from Kuwait, 702 from Saudi Arabia, 701 from Bahrain, 707 from Oman and 847 from Qatar.2 Throughout this report, we will display the results from each country as well as the simple average for results from all five countries. The target population for this survey included people who were 18 years or older and who lived in labour camps in the GCC countries during the survey reference period. Based on the information about the number of people in the camp, the sampling frame was divided into strata, and proportionate stratified sampling was used to draw separate samples from these strata. Proportionate sampling ensures that the proportion of people in each type is the same between the frame and the sample. To randomly select migrant workers in the camp, a multistage sample design was employed. Each camp was considered as a primary sampling unit, and each room in the camp was considered as a secondary sampling unit. In the first stage, the camp was selected with probability proportionate to its size. This gives an equal chance selection

Conditions of migrant workers in the GCC 77 for migrant workers while allowing the same number of people being chosen from each camp and for each stratum. In the second stage after selecting camps, the room was selected with circular systematic sampling. As migrant workers from the same country tend to live in adjacent rooms, the selection of rooms by systematic method helps to reduce the chance of selecting people from the same country, hence increasing the variation in characteristics of sample migrant workers. Finally, one person in each room was randomly selected. The questionnaire was initially developed in English and then translated into Arabic, Hindi, Urdu, Tagalog and Nepalese. Pretest of the instrument was conducted in each of the GCC countries where the survey was fielded. Interviewers’ and supervisors’ debriefing meetings were also held in each country. Adjustments were made to the instrument based on the pretest results and the debriefing meetings.

Results Of the total foreign labour force in the Gulf, South Asian migrants represent the majority. This is reflected in our survey results, where, on average, South Asians represent 80 per cent of the respondents across the five countries. Thus, we can say that the findings we present here for migrant workers in the Gulf overall hold true for South Asian migrants as a group. On average, workers in the KSA reported that they spent seven years living and working in the country, which is the longest time among the surveyed Gulf nations, compared to five years in Kuwait and Oman, and six years in Qatar and Bahrain. With regards to the type of work performed by the migrant workers in each of the GCC countries, respondents were asked about their main daily occupation. Some of the most frequently mentioned occupations across the GCC countries were carpentry, electrical work, construction work, driving and security guards. Occupations such as plumbing, tailoring, painting and welding were indicated less frequently. Salary Most of the workers across the countries reported being paid on a monthly basis (100 per cent of workers in Saudi Arabia, 99 per cent in both Kuwait and Bahrain, 98 per cent in Oman and 97 per cent in Qatar). About 1 per cent of those in Qatar reported being paid on a weekly basis. As for the daily payments, 1 per cent of the workers in both Kuwait and Bahrain and 2 per cent in Oman and Qatar reported being paid on a daily basis. From Table 6.1, we can see that

78  Diop, Kien and Ewers Table 6.1  Amount earned from primary job

Kuwait Saudi Arabia Bahrain Oman Qatar Average

Mean US dollars per month

Median US dollars per month

404.2 223.4 322.5 269.4 455.9 335.1

397.2 221.4 318.0 234.0 351.0 304.3

Source: Authors’ survey.

on average migrant workers in the GCC earned US$335 per month. Workers in Qatar and Kuwait reported earning the highest monthly salaries, US$464 and US$432, respectively, followed by those in Bahrain (US$323) and Oman (US$270). Workers in Saudi Arabia reported receiving the lowest salaries, averaging US$221 per month. However, it is important to note that analysis of the data revealed that workers’ reported monthly salaries did not include allowances for accommodation, electricity, water and transportation costs, which are most often borne by the employer. Benefits In addition to their salary, a number of interviewed migrant workers reported receiving some benefits such as annual leave, health and accident insurance, accommodation, food allowance, complimentary water and electricity as well as transportation to and from the workplace. These are shown in Table 6.2. However, a considerable number of migrant workers reported not receiving any benefits at all from their primary jobs (21 per cent in Qatar, 13 per cent in Oman, 12 per cent in Bahrain, 5 per cent in Saudi Arabia and 4 per cent in Kuwait). Indeed, on average 11 per cent of workers across these five countries reported receiving no benefits. This section describes the different types of benefits provided to migrant workers by their employers. Food allowance In addition to their salary, approximately one-third (31 per cent) of migrant workers reported receiving food allowances from their employers. Compared to the majority of migrants working in Oman (78 per cent), only few in the remaining four GCC countries surveyed received

Conditions of migrant workers in the GCC 79 Table 6.2 Other benefits from current (primary) job (%) besides money paid for work Kuwait Housing allowance Food allowance Health insurance Accident insurance Paid holidays Paid sick leave Free water/ electricity Transport to/ from work Access to training Other No benefits

Saudi Arabia

Bahrain

Oman

Qatar

Average

64

0

42

75

37

44

10

35

11

78

22

31

52

79

22

77

21

50

3

16

17

75

10

24

24 31 45

29 35 60

63 73 72

77 77 82

41 21 51

47 47 62

55

49

62

72

51

58

2

3

1

25

0

6

1 4

0 5

0 12

0 13

12 21

3 11

Source: Authors’ survey.

this benefit. These findings indicate that most migrant labourers working in the GCC countries have to devote an amount of their salary for food and drink expenses. This is especially true only in Kuwait and Bahrain, where only one in ten workers receive food allowances. Transportation allowance The majority of migrant workers in Oman (72 per cent) and Bahrain (62 per cent) said they were provided with transportation to and from the workplace by their employer, while about half of those in Saudi Arabia (49 per cent), Qatar (51 per cent) and Kuwait (55 per cent) reported receiving this benefit. Across all five countries, more than half (58 per cent) of workers reported receiving this transportation. Variations across the GCC countries regarding the transportation services provided to the labourers might be related to the workers’ type of accommodations as well as availability of public transportation alternatives in each country. A closer examination of the data revealed that most of those who are provided with such transportation actually live in an employer-provided accommodation (mostly labour camps).

80  Diop, Kien and Ewers Annual leave, sick leave and paid holidays Concerning annual leave, our findings vary across the sampled GCC countries. In fact, the majority of migrant workers who have been working in their host country for at least two years have actually had an annual leave. Approximately half (47 per cent) of the workers across the five countries reported receiving paid holidays, from a low of 24 per cent in Kuwait to a high of 77 per cent in Oman. Approximately half (47 per cent) of the workers reported receiving paid sick leave, from a low of approximately 21 per cent in Qatar to a high of 77 per cent in Oman. Again, workers in Oman appear to receive higher levels of benefits than in other countries. Health and accident insurance Our survey also inquired about health and accident insurance as part of other job benefits provided to migrant workers by their employers. The vast majority of labourers currently working in Saudi Arabia (79 per cent) and Oman (77 per cent), and slightly more than half of those in Kuwait (52 per cent), reported receiving health insurance from their primary job. On the other hand, eight out of ten migrant workers in Bahrain and Qatar are not covered by an employer-provided health insurance. Concerning accident insurance, findings of the survey indicate that the number of migrant workers who received accident insurance from their employers is highest in Oman compared to other GCC countries. These variations across the surveyed countries may be partially explained by the differences in contract details and how they are implemented. Work hours and rest days Excessively long working hours without appropriate rest days may have a negative impact on migrants’ overall work productivity, as well as psychological and physical health. When asked about the average number of work hours per day, the results were quite similar across the region, ranging between nine and ten hours per day. In Qatar, workers reported working an average of 9.2 hours per day, which was the lowest compared to 9.5 hours in Kuwait and 9.6 in Saudi Arabia and Oman. The highest reported among the surveyed countries was in Bahrain, where workers reported working an average of almost 10 hours a day (9.9). Reports on the number of working days were similar across the countries. In all countries, the median was six days, allowing workers to have one rest day during the week.

Conditions of migrant workers in the GCC 81 Concerning weekly rest days, the findings of the survey indicate that all the GCC countries attempt to guarantee a minimum of one day off per week for migrant workers, as shown in Table 6.3. In general, vast majorities of workers in Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Oman, Kuwait and Bahrain said they are entitled to an average of one resting day per week, while about one-third (30 per cent) of Oman’s migrant workers said they are entitled to two days off per week. However, in Qatar, one out of ten labourers reported working seven days per week. Further analysis of the data revealed that some of the workers in Qatar held two different jobs, which might be the reason they did not indicate having a weekly rest day. Employer problems and work difficulties Migrant workers were also asked to indicate whether they had problems with their employers and to report the causes of these problems. As shown in Table 6.4, workers in Kuwait were the most likely to Table 6.3  Number of rest day(s) allowed during the week (%)

0 1 2 3–4 Total

Kuwait

Saudi Arabia

Bahrain

Oman

Qatar

Average

0 95 5 0 100

0 94 3 3 100

0 96 4 0 100

0 67 30 3 100

9 81 9 1 100

2 87 10 1 100

Source: Authors’ survey.

Table 6.4  Most important difficulties faced by migrant workers at workplace (%) Kuwait Saudi Arabia Bahrain Oman Qatar Average Employment conditions Income (low pay) Poor housing conditions Lack of family life Job switching Other None/no difficulties

14

19

25

2

3

13

60 13

59 10

48 13

15 5

16 2

40 9

22 0 1 24

21 1 0 31

39 3 0 35

14 2 0 72

7 1 2 78

21 1 1 48

Source: Authors’ survey.

82  Diop, Kien and Ewers report having problems with their current employers (26 per cent), followed by those in Saudi Arabia (16 per cent) and Oman (11 per cent), while workers in both Qatar and Bahrain were the least likely to do so, with 6 and 5 per cent, respectively. When asked about the causes of these problems occurring with the employers, migrant workers reported a variety of reasons mainly related to low income, hard working conditions (long working hours, strict contract regulations), poor housing conditions and lack of family life. In fact, these difficulties stated by the workers were similar across the different GCC countries (35 per cent in Bahrain, 31 per cent in Saudi Arabia and 14 per cent in Kuwait). However, a good number of workers in both Qatar and Oman (78 and 72 per cent, respectively) reported not facing any difficulty at the time of the study. With regard to their attitudes and perceptions towards the difficulties that they face in the GCC countries, and the overall conditions of their employment, respondents were asked whether they would still have moved to their GCC country of employment if they had prior knowledge of the problems they would encounter. The results are shown in Figure 6.1. It is noteworthy that a majority of workers in Kuwait (69 per cent), Bahrain (62 per cent) and Oman (53 per cent) reported that they would still have moved to these countries even if they had been aware of the difficulties. This is also the case for almost half (48 per cent) of the respondents in Qatar and slightly more than one-quarter (26 per cent) of respondents in Saudi Arabia. However, it should also be noted that the percentage of those who reported being unsure whether they would have moved was substantial for workers in Oman (41 per cent) and Saudi Arabia (39 per cent). Possible Kuwait 69%

62%

53%

Saudi Arabia

Bahrain

48%

26%

35% 22%

Qatar

41%

39%

39% 26% 6%

Yes, would move

Oman

No, would not move

9%

12%

13%

Not sure

Figure 6.1 If you had known about these difficulties before you came to (this country), would you still have decided to move here? Source: Authors’ survey.

Conditions of migrant workers in the GCC 83 Table 6.5 Any cases of verbal abuse or physical abuse experienced or were aware of with employment (%)

None Verbal abuse Physical abuse

Kuwait

Saudi Arabia

Bahrain

Oman

Qatar

Average

93 1

85 11

95 4

92 2

97 2

92 4

4

1

2

2

1

2

Source: Authors’ survey.

explanations for the fact that a significant number of workers said they would still move to the Gulf despite knowing about all the difficulties they would face include problems facing workers in their home countries, such as inadequate employment opportunities, and the overall satisfaction with their life reported in their respective GCC country. Unlike what is widely reported in the press, physical and verbal abuses were rarely reported by migrant workers in the Gulf who participated in our survey. As shown in Table 6.5, we can see that, across the different GCC countries, the majority of surveyed workers reported not being aware of or having experienced any physical or verbal abuse. Physical abuse was rarely reported by workers in both Qatar and Saudi Arabia (1 per cent) as well as in Bahrain and Oman (2 per cent in each). In Kuwait, 4 per cent of respondents reported either being aware of or personally experiencing physical abuse. On the other hand, 11 per cent of respondents working in Saudi Arabia and 4 per cent of those in Bahrain reported either experiencing or being aware of verbal abuse. Worker satisfaction and future intentions Migrant workers were asked several questions related to their level of satisfaction with their employers, wages, housing, food, transportation and medical care. Overall, the vast majority of the migrant workers in Oman (90 per cent), Qatar (84 per cent) and Bahrain (82 per cent) said they were satisfied with the way their employers treated them in the workplace, as shown in Figure 6.2. In Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, fewer migrant workers reported satisfaction with the way their employers treated them (54 and 55 per cent, respectively). Table 6.6 shows that satisfaction with wages also varies across the GCC countries. While the majority of migrants in Oman, Qatar and Bahrain said they were satisfied with their current salaries (78, 74 and

84  Diop, Kien and Ewers Kuwait

Saudi Arabia

Bahrain 82%

Oman 90%

Qatar 84%

55%

54%

Satisfied

Figure 6.2 How satisfied are you with how your employer treats you at your workplace? Table 6.6 Percentage of respondents who reported being ‘very satisfied’ or ‘somewhat satisfied’ with allowances in their lives

Wage/salary Housing Food Transportation Medical care

Kuwait Saudi Arabia Bahrain Oman

Qatar Average

37 72 92 92 86

74 91 92 93 88

36 56 74 73 72

61 81 91 94 55

78 86 86 85 86

57 77 87 87 77

Source: Authors’ survey.

61 per cent, respectively), fewer migrant workers in Kuwait (37 per cent) and in Saudi Arabia (36 per cent) reported being satisfied with their wages. Satisfaction with housing accommodations was also high in Qatar (91 per cent), Bahrain (82 per cent), Oman (87 per cent) and Kuwait (72 per cent). Similarly, fewer migrant workers in Saudi Arabia (56 per cent) expressed satisfaction with their housing. Satisfaction ratings with food and transportation were also high across all of the surveyed GCC countries. As for medical care, fewer migrant workers in Bahrain (55 per cent) and in Oman (72 per cent) expressed satisfaction. Figure 6.3 shows the responses to a question about where workers would like to be living in one year from the time of the survey. When asked about their future intentions towards working in their current GCC country of residence, the majority of migrant workers across

Conditions of migrant workers in the GCC 85 the surveyed GCC countries (86 per cent in Kuwait, 85 per cent in Bahrain, 84 per cent in Oman, 78 per cent in Qatar and 65 per cent in Saudi Arabia, respectively) stated that they would like to be living in their current country of work and residence one year from the time of the survey. Migrant workers were asked whether they intend to seek to renew their contract in this country or another country. The results in Figure 6.4 show that while the majority of migrant workers would like Kuwait 85% 84% 78%

86%

Saudi Arabia

Bahrain

Oman

Qatar

65%

22% 11%

2% 5% 5% 2% 2% Living in (this country)

6%

17% 13% 1%

Home country

Living in (this country) but contract is about to expire

8%

4% 1% 2%

Someplace else

Figure 6.3 Would you like to be living in (this country) one year from now, or do you hope to be living in someplace else by then? Source: Authors’ survey. Kuwait

Saudi Arabia

Bahrain

Oman

Qatar

87% 90%

88% 73% 76%

16% 4% In (this country)

21% 7%

2%

In another country

8% 11%

8% 3% 6%

I do not want to renew my contract

Figure 6.4 Do you intend to seek to renew your contract in (this country), or in another country? Source: Authors’ survey.

86  Diop, Kien and Ewers Table 6.7 Topics or issues to be covered if an organization were to conduct an informational or an educational programme about foreign workers in (this country) (%) Kuwait Saudi Arabia Bahrain Oman Qatar Average Rights of foreign workers Information on residence visas Cost of living Employment opportunities General information

69

77

60

22

49

55

26

39

23

7

24

24

42 42

42 26

48 58

12 25

19 24

33 35

26

9

37

45

21

28

Source: Authors’ survey.

to renew their contract in the same country, about one-fifth of them in Bahrain (21 per cent) and in Saudi Arabia (16 per cent) mentioned that they would seek to move to another country. However, 11 per cent of the workers in Saudi Arabia and 8 per cent of those in both Qatar and Kuwait reported that they are not planning to renew their job contracts. Finally, when migrant workers were asked which topics or programmes they would like to be more informed about, shown in Table 6.7, nearly half to more than three-quarters of the respondents in Qatar (49 per cent), Kuwait (69 per cent) and Saudi Arabia (77 per cent) indicated ‘the rights of foreign workers’ as their top choice. The topic of residence visas was also frequently mentioned by workers in Saudi Arabia (39 per cent), Kuwait (26 per cent), Qatar (24 per cent) and Bahrain (23 per cent). Furthermore, learning more about employment opportunities was the most commonly selected topic of workers in Bahrain (58 per cent) and in Kuwait (42 per cent). Nearly half (45 per cent) of the migrant workers in Oman suggested educational programmes covering general information about foreign workers.

Conclusion Human rights organizations have increasingly put pressure on the GCC countries to safeguard the rights of all migrant workers. With the World Expo 2020 coming to Dubai and the crackdown on illegal migrants in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia in 2013, issues of migrant

Conditions of migrant workers in the GCC 87 workers and their treatment will likely be a persistent concern underlying the debate about migration in the Arabian Gulf countries for years to come. An improved and global understanding of the lives and experiences of these workers in the Arab Gulf countries is essential for the planning and development of labour force policies in each of the GCC countries. It also has implications for the broader issue of the movement of workers and their concerns worldwide. Therefore, it is important to study the demographic and social characteristics of blue-collar workers including their living and working conditions, their remittances to family members left behind, and the nature and frequency of the problems and challenges they face in the workplace. From this report, we can see a mixed view of the living and working conditions of migrant workers in the Gulf. It is clear that across the region, these migrants work very hard for very low pay and few benefits, and without the prospects or protections of citizenship. There are variations within and between the countries. For example, workers in Oman report the second-lowest wages of the five countries, but better benefits, fewest workplace difficulties and highest levels of satisfaction. Workers in Saudi Arabia reported the lowest wages of any country, but also regularly reported the fewest benefits, greatest workplace difficulties, lowest levels of satisfaction and highest reports of verbal abuse. Workers in Saudi Arabia were also the least likely to say they would have come to the country if they had known of the difficulties they would have faced. Workers in Kuwait received the highest wages but were also the least satisfied with their wages. In contrast to Saudi Arabia, workers in Kuwait were more likely than workers in any of the other countries to say that they would have still decided to come to the country if they would have known the difficulties they would have faced. The point here is that just as the conditions vary from country to country, so do the types of areas most in need of improvement for each country. For some countries, the most important area may be in the raising of wages, or offering certain types of benefits not currently available. For other countries, the priority may be to reduce instances of abuse or reduce the number of working hours in a day or working days in a week. This variation illustrates why it is so important for us to conduct large-scale, cross-country surveys. Indeed, migrant workers in the GCC are not experiencing a single, common set of Gulf work conditions. To return to the topics or issues that workers think should be covered by an educational programme about foreign workers, there is tremendous variation across GCC countries in the areas seen needing the most attention.

88  Diop, Kien and Ewers Conversely, we can say that across the Gulf, it is the Kafala system of worker sponsorship which is most responsible for the working and living conditions of migrant workers. With international pressure, there have been slight changes in some countries, but these changes have been slow and inconsistent. For example, Qatar has just updated its sponsorship law to make it easier for migrant workers to leave the country and overall less dependent on their sponsor (Kovessy et al., 2015). In addition, with the implementation of a wage protection system, migrant workers are now required to have a bank account and their employers are required to deposit pay cheques electronically in these accounts. The wage protection system has also facilitated the sending of remittances via text message-based mobile payment systems, which do not require data plans and are less costly than traditional international wire transfer services. These incremental measures will certainly not be enough to change the overall conditions experienced by migrant workers in the Gulf, but they do represent an improvement for today’s migrant workers over yesterday’s workers.

Notes 1 The Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries include Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. 2 The UAE was excluded from this study because we were not able to secure administrative permission to field the survey.

References Babar, Z.R. 2014. ‘The Cost of Belonging: Citizenship Construction in the State of Qatar’, The Middle East Journal 68(3): 403–420. Booth, R. 2013. ‘Qatar World Cup Construction “Will Leave 4,000 Migrant Workers Dead” ’, Guardian, 26 September. http://www.theguardian.com/ global-development/2013/sep/26/qatar-world-cup-migrant-workers-dead. De Bel-Air, F. 2014. ‘Demography, Migration, and Labour Market in Qatar’. Gulf Labour Markets and Migration (GLMM) Explanatory Note No. 8/2014. De Bel-Air, F. 2015. ‘Demography, Migration, and Labour Market in Qatar’. Gulf Labour Markets and Migration (GLMM) Explanatory Note No. 7/2015. Gardner, A., S. Pessoa, A. Diop, K. Al-Ghanim, K. Le Trung and L. Harkness. 2013. ‘A Portrait of Low-income Migrants in Contemporary Qatar’, Journal of Arabian Studies 3(1): 1–17. Kovessy, P., R. Sheble and H. Fahmy. 2015. ‘Qatar’s Emir Signs into Law Kafala Changes’, Doha News, 27 October. http://dohanews.co/ qatars-emir-approves-kafala-reforms-changes-more-than-one-year-away/.

Conditions of migrant workers in the GCC 89 Lobel, M. 2015. ‘Arrested for Reporting on Qatar’s World Cup Labourers’, BBC News, 18 May. http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-32775563. Shaheen, K. and O. Gibson. 2015. ‘Qatar Delays Vote on Pledge to Reform “Abusive” Worker Sponsorship System’, Guardian, 23 June. http://www. theguardian.com/world/2015/jun/23/qatar-delays-vote-kafala-systemworker-sponsorship-human-rights.

7 Are India’s policies increasing the vulnerability of its female migrants in the Arab Gulf countries? Radhika Kanchana It is not a new feminisation of migration to the Gulf region The more recent emigration from India to the Arab Gulf countries is significant from the 1970s, although it already started at least from the early part of the twentieth century under the British Raj, which also administered the Gulf region along with the Indian subcontinent. But the two-way human flows between the two geographical regions predate to a much earlier period, and certain regions were more engaged (see Osella and Osella, 2012). The Gulf countries started mass labour recruitment policies after their independence and after their high economic growth since they began to export oil. The Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) region today has a distinctive demographic composition with a large foreign population: the biggest expatriate group is Indian. It is true that the foreign migrant population in the six GCC countries – the UAE, Qatar, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Oman and Kuwait – is predominantly male and blue collar. However, the female composition is also large. The Indian female migration to the region is also not new (see Leonard, 2002). The migration of nannies and tutors from certain regions in India, like Goa, began from the time of the British rule. The size and composition of the female migrant population of Indian nationality have increased and expanded to diversified sectors today, essentially in the service industry. The domestic work sector is predominant, and it significantly picked up since the 1980s (male domestic workers also exist, for example, as drivers and cooks). An estimate puts the number of migrant domestic workers in the GCC countries at 2.4 million (ITUC, 2014). Health care and education are the most popular professional sectors that typically have expatriate women. Indians are prominent as doctors, as nurses in particular and as related-support

Vulnerability of Indian female migrants in Gulf 91 staff in the health care market across the Gulf region. The migration of Indian nurses to the region has been an early and a sustained phenomenon (see Percot, 2006; Percot and Rajan, 2007). The women are also in other sectors like entertainment and hospitality and in service occupations such as hairdressing. Many secretarial/administrative jobs in the GCC continue to engage the spouses of the Indian professionals working there, although somewhat informally because of the local restrictions to work. Bahrain, for instance, permits them to work as teachers, as medical professionals and in top managerial positions in the banking sector.1 The Kafala or the visa-sponsorship system prevalent in the Gulf region ties the migrant’s work and the residence permit to a specific sponsor2 and has produced an exploitative socio-legal context (Longva, 1999; Gardner, 2011). The local patriarchal environment implies even more restrictions for the female regarding residence and in the labour market: for example, only a male expatriate based on salary and occupation could sponsor dependents (spouse and children); foreign women could work only in specific domains; and domestic workers are excluded from the labour laws.3 India ranks the third after Nepal and Sri Lanka in the national proportion of foreign female migrants in the Gulf region (Thimothy and Sasikumar, 2012). The estimated figure of the female emigrants is about 20 per cent of the total migrant population from India. Kerala in India sends about 15 per cent of its migrants as female workers (Zachariah and Rajan, 2012) (on domestic workers, including other nationalities in the region, see Moors et al., 2009; Strobl, 2009; Bajracharya and Sijapati, 2012; Pattadath and Moors, 2012). Fieldwork in four GCC countries (Bahrain, Oman, Qatar and the UAE) and in India (Kerala and Andhra Pradesh) over the period between 2008 and 2011 was done as part of the doctoral research. The paper discusses India’s policies for female emigration, especially for semi-skilled or unskilled work and some effects they produced. It highlights the plight of two groups as the most vulnerable in the female migrant population in the Gulf region due to limits on resources accessible to them: the ‘runaway’ domestic worker and the victim of trafficking for sex.

Indian policy: an evolution of responses India’s emigration policy is generally discriminative to the lower-skilled emigrant. And it is far from a gender-sensitive policy to recognise the right of women to migrate and to provide sufficient facilities to enable

92  Radhika Kanchana the potential emigrant to make more informed choices. A female emigrant in the lower-skilled group hence experiences a double restriction. India is among the sending countries that still have few regulations covering emigration – they mostly date from the 1980s (Manseau, 2006: 37). India’s foreign employment policy is a regulated system, in which the state of origin adopts laws and regulations governing the recruitment of nationals for employment abroad (Khadria, 2010; Kumar, 2014). It is protective in objective. It mainly addresses temporary and contract migration, especially of the lower-skilled emigrants, through recruitment laws, minimum standards and a regulatory authority. The important policy instrument is the Emigration Act of India, 1983. It replaced the colonial-era Emigration Act of 1922, whose objective was mainly to regulate the recruitment of the unskilled agricultural workers.4 There was a need for a change after the high instance of abuses in the wake of the boom in jobs in the Arab Gulf region from the 1970s and the indiscriminate practices of the private and illegal recruitment agencies. The 1983 legislation has two main elements. The first is emigration clearance: the Protector General of Emigrants is the mandated authority, and it works through ten Protector of Emigrants offices (PoE) across India.5 All Indian passports are categorised into Emigration Clearance Required (ECR) or Emigration Clearance Not Required, based on the qualification level of the individual. The underlying principle is that a lesser-skilled migrant is vulnerable. The eligibility level for emigration clearance today is reduced to a matriculation qualification (secondary education). The number of destination countries for which a clearance is required is also reduced to 17: the six GCC countries and, in addition, Malaysia, Libya, Jordan, Yemen, Sudan, Afghanistan, Indonesia, Syria, Lebanon, Thailand and Iraq. The emigration of the individual is permitted after scrutinisation of the sufficiency/validity of the employment contracts that ‘the terms and conditions are neither discriminatory nor exploitative and that provisions for travel, wages and working and living conditions are in conformity with the prescribed norms’ (Thimothy and Hussain, 2008). The second is the regulation of the recruitment via the licensing of the recruitment agencies. The recruitment agencies can operate only after the state recognises them by the grant of a registration certificate, based on ‘the financial soundness, trustworthiness, adequacy of premises, and experience in the field of manpower export’ (Thimothy and Hussain, 2008). The Indian government adopted a more definite ‘protective’ stance on the gender element, as a response in particular to the public eruption in the 1990s of the violence against the female workers overseas (Kodoth and Varghese, 2012). An age criterion is introduced. Today,

Vulnerability of Indian female migrants in Gulf 93 clearance is restricted to female migrants above 30 years for semiskilled or unskilled work, if they are below matriculation education level. The Ministry of Labour first adopted it in 2002 applicable to Kuwait after its war in 1990–91 (migration was banned for a period). The government confirmed it again in August 2007 and successively extended it to the region and then to all the countries. Thirty years for female candidates in the ECR category is ‘a mandatory restriction irrespective of the nature/category of employment’, and ‘age is used as a crucial variable to restrict the international migration of female workers, particularly that of the domestic workers’ (Thimothy and Sasikumar, 2012; see also Table 7.1 for details). In addition to the restriction on the age factor, there are varied enforcement measures that expose the female emigrants to degrees of discretionary and corruptive practices. The state governments selectively practise or introduce their own regulations often based on moral judgement – for example, Andhra Pradesh, Goa, Kerala and Tamil Nadu. They send the majority of the female migrants to the Gulf. The different enforcement agencies like the PoEs and the State Police do the same in the absence of more standardised procedures or a coherent coordination – for example, variations in the documents required to grant an emigration clearance. The general logic of ‘emigration clearance’ not only falls far short of giving the results (owing to severe infrastructure limitations and the lack of any real protection measures) but also creates a differentiated citizenship (Varghese and Irudaya Rajan, 2011). ‘Restrictive migration policies have reduced the possibilities for regular and legal migration for females, forcing them to adopt risky processes to migrate’ (Thimothy and Sasikumar, 2012). Critics point out that the legislation in fact reintroduces the colonial mechanism – that it is actually discrimination, in the guise of protection. They also criticise the monitoring of the recruitment process – that it excessively privileges the licensing role over the other functions of enabling the Table 7.1  Age restrictions by some countries on female migration for work Country

Condition

Bangladesh India

Women must be at least 25 years old Women must be at least 30 years old or should have completed matriculation Women must be at least 18 years old Women must be at least 35 years old Women must be at least 21 years old

Nepal Pakistan Sri Lanka

Source: Thimothy and Sasikumar (2012: 27).

94  Radhika Kanchana emigration. One example is the promotional aspect, which includes skill training and upgradation and welfare measures like providing for social security (Thimothy and Hussain, 2008). India took some recent initiatives to respond to the interests of the Indian migrants. It established the Ministry of Overseas Indian Affairs in 2004 as a federal-level dedicated authority on issues relating to its citizens abroad. And it introduced two social security mechanisms targeted at the semi-skilled or unskilled emigrant in the ECR category: a compulsory insurance scheme, Pravasi Bharatiya Bima Yojana, in 2006, and a pension and life insurance scheme, Mahatma Gandhi Pravasi Suraksha Yojana, in 2012–13 (at the moment, they are still intermittently mobilised and in the initial stages). India’s engagement in international cooperative effort might at least produce some coordinated policy: in the Colombo Process6 with other labour-sending countries in Asia and in the Abu Dhabi Dialogue since 2008 for a better coordination between the countries of origin and the destination Gulf countries. India also uses the bilateral agreements and memorandums of understanding with the destination countries to mutually regulate the labour/and migration conditions7 as a more flexible tool, although it is more of an ad hoc mechanism. India’s proposed National Policy for Domestic Workers (the draft policy is currently awaiting approval8) is a promising legislation because it might strengthen the legitimacy of its call for effective reform in the host countries (on the limited reform in the GCC region, see Varia, 2011; ITUC, 2014). Despite some recent positive steps, India’s general policy course towards the female migrant reveals that policy since the past three decades was largely a response to the incidence and the scale of the abuse of the female migrant overseas, particularly the domestic worker. Second, the policy objective is increasingly to restrict the female migrant, supposedly for her own welfare (e.g. restrictions on the age and on the migration to certain receiving countries).

Mere protection has proved counterproductive We could observe the disempowered conditions of the Indian female workers currently experienced in the host GCC region. The domestic workers who have run away face twice the vulnerability Many of the problems faced by the women domestic workers are universal in the Gulf region and are also frequently faced by their male colleagues in the lower-skilled group. Among the most common

Vulnerability of Indian female migrants in Gulf 95 problems are irregular or non-payment of wages, passport confiscation by their sponsor-employer resulting in limitations on their mobility and creating the conditions of indentured labour (in addition, a part of their earnings are often retained by the recruitment agencies) and discriminative and abusive treatment. In addition to these, the problematic issues more specific to female migrants are the incidence of sexual abuse, greater restrictions on their physical mobility and their sociality and exposure to physical violence that might also lead to death. The key element is that the workplace of the domestic workers is the private domain of the employer’s home (on devaluation of domestic work, see Anderson, 2001). The domestic work is not covered under the national labour laws in the Gulf at the moment, based on the reason that the private space of a household is not to be disturbed. This is a recurring constraint in the official and other humanitarian efforts to curb the widespread violations concerning the female domestic workers. Many laws that affect the migrant labourer, such as the recent provisions for minimum wage, maximum weekly hours, rest and vacation time, hence do not apply to the domestic workers (on the state of domestic workers in the region, see Sabban, 2002; Fernandez, 2014). Moreover, as a lawyer-activist in Bahrain noted, it prevents speedier settlement of grievances as through the labour courts: ‘(domestic workers’) cases are lumped with cases in criminal courts. Thus, simple cases involving non-payment of salaries and compliance with working hours sometimes go all the way to the police and justice ministry courts’. The act of ‘running-away’ – a breach of contract for the employer – is criminalised under the local rules dictated by the sponsorship system. A foreign worker is marked a runaway and becomes a criminal (with an illegal status) if he or she chooses to work for another employer. The main reason that a domestic worker runs away is the harsh conditions found at the employer’s house, and the step is taken often in desperation. It could also be in anticipation of better conditions or an opportunity to earn more elsewhere, and sometimes it is at the encouragement of the co-expatriates that she has contact with. The domestic workers are normally unaware of the local laws that they would stand to lose their legal status and would not be able to work again in the host country (resident and work permit being linked to the sponsor). The only legal possibility for the runaway female migrant, except on rarest occasions, is to return to the employer or to be sent back to India (after her detention or even her ‘rescue’). Shelters are a newer development, where the migrant could lodge temporarily and find help (Buhejji, 2011). Her condition is legally, financially and

96  Radhika Kanchana physically precarious if the worker continues to stay in the country. Runaway female migrants are in a criminal status and generally without any official documents. Their vulnerability is even more enhanced if their entry in the country was itself based on false papers processed by the rogue recruiting agents. Therefore, many runaway workers usually fear to even approach their embassy for help. Accommodation is particularly a critical factor. Evidently, the female worker is significantly more vulnerable than a male runaway worker with the clandestine status. Some runaway women are fortunate if they succeed in being also given accommodation on finding another domestic work with a new employer (could be by either a national or an expatriate). Both such alternative (and clandestine) work arrangement and lodging would be illegal, and hence, it would also expose the female worker to exploitation. Some others are still fortunate, who succeeded to team with the other runaway domestic workers to share an accommodation. However, the female runaway worker is usually forced to rely on the assistance of the male expatriate. Particularly because of the patriarchal Arab local context, even if the male was also an illegal worker, he still has a better access to varied local resources. He further has the advantage to enjoy a freer movement in the public space. The women hence accept the ‘protection’ of a male co-expatriate in exchange for a roof and safety (sometimes they also share their earnings). It is sometimes a genuine mutual-support relationship. It is becoming a quite visible trend and noted in the migrant social circles, to be occurring on a wider scale. Hence, the trend of ‘convenience arrangements’ is a recourse used by the runaway women. However, the women are often abandoned later by the ‘boyfriend’. Then, the women enter into a series of such arrangements to continue to keep a roof and to continue to work and to send the remittances home. These conditions thus translate to mean an acute vulnerability for runaway female workers. The illegal status compounds the absolute imperative to maintain a roof, the financial necessity and their dependence on the goodwill of a male co-expatriate. Strict restrictions on family reunion create specific conditions in the Gulf context that partly explain the facilitative conditions for such convenience practices. The expatriate population in the GCC region is predominantly male and single, denied of conjugal lives for extended periods (on bachelor lives of workers, see Gardner, 2011; Bruslé, 2012). Some expatriate activists in Muscat had expressed concern at this newer trend of the runaway domestic worker-cohabitation relationships as akin to immoral relationships or as a kind of prostitution and as threatening the bonds

Vulnerability of Indian female migrants in Gulf 97 with the workers’ spouses or family members in India. It is, however, also a survival strategy that shows an agency by the female migrants. Nevertheless, these arrangements and the ‘confidence relationships’ are ripe with the potential for the women’s further exploitation (see the next section on the trafficking for sex). The scenario described earlier highlights the heightened precarious status of the runaway domestic workers and their resultant and often desperate acts to help themselves. The women are also particularly victim to the shadow industry of trafficking The trafficking industry is a common problem across the GCC countries, and it is accentuated here because the region is a closed labour market. It operates in different forms based on the local context, and either it is below the tabs or it has a more publicly visible operation. Although trafficking is primarily associated in the region with female migrants, it has a broader relevance and applies to the male as well. It also applies to many abusive practices presently occurring in the Gulf region, such as the conditions of forced labour, substitution or absence of a contract and confiscation of passport. Human trafficking involves the process of the traffickers procuring people to exploit them by using deception and/or some form of coercion to lure and control them. Trafficking is a thriving business connected with migration in the Gulf corridor, and the problem is particularly serious concerning the female migrants under the present socio-legal context here. The trafficking of women for sex trade is one of the ugliest faces of the exploitation-prone migration market in the Arab Gulf region. We focus on this aspect because it is also the most identified activity as constituting trafficking here. The recruiting agencies and the sponsor-employers cheat the women9 in most cases. A majority of Indian victims were hired by the recruitment companies in India for domestic work or other employment and were forced into prostitution upon arrival in the host country. Others were typically brought in on fake documents and subsequently blackmailed into sex trade or to face jail or deportation. In other instances, the women were duped or kidnapped into the flesh trade by their ‘rescuers’ or sometimes the co-expatriate colleagues (boyfriends, taxi drivers, other such intermediaries often known to the women). It is a misnomer that it is the lowskilled or the unskilled female worker who is exposed to trafficking. There are also many cases that stand evidence to the contrary. For instance, an activist in Muscat narrated a story of an educated woman

98  Radhika Kanchana who was a trafficking victim and was recently rescued, who had worked as a teacher in Kerala and hailed from a middle-income and social class family background prior to arriving in the Gulf. It is less documented, but there were anecdotal narratives during the fieldwork that women were also cheated into the flesh trade by their husbands and relatives. The husbands got the brides into the commercial sex trade, or the women became vulnerable to the trafficking after their husbands deserted them after a period of marriage. Sometimes, the brides were married to the local citizen and shared the same Islamic faith.10 Reports by humanitarian agencies have confirmed these common narratives for other nationalities. For instance, an ILO report noted some cases of Iraqi and Syrian girls in Lebanon.11 Trafficking for sex is hence prevalent in the GCC region. It generally works in the shadow domains or with spurious links to more formal activities. The entertainment and the hospitality sectors are the most dominant areas for potential abuse partly also because there are generally restrictions concerning these sectors. The entry of the female workers is determined by the visa type available to them in the host country (for domestic workers, nurses and teachers and for specific categories like personal/or beauty care sectors). Bahrain and the UAE are more liberal in the entertainment and the tourism sectors for instance, and they give greater access to the female migrants to enter. Qatar, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia have stricter rules, and the trafficking industry here possibly operates underground much more and hence perhaps the abuse is also more severe. Both the local nationals and the Indian nationals are involved in the trafficking industry. The trafficking problem in the Gulf is primarily blamed on the unscrupulous recruitment agents. But it often implicates the involvement of the officials at several levels and also the individuals with powerful influence and connections (in both the receiving and the sending countries). However, it is the prevalence of the following factors that lead the female migrant into the hands of the predatory agents in the first place: the non-accountability or the blame-free atmosphere in the host countries, where the national abusing his control over the worker derived from his sponsorship usually escapes punishment; the highly restrictive nature of the destination labour markets for women; and the atmosphere of discouragement to migrate in the home countries. The earlier discussion reveals two scenarios where the female worker is more acutely vulnerable mainly because of insufficient access to resources. In addition, both the official and unofficial effort in the host territory persistently use the rescue narrative to address

Vulnerability of Indian female migrants in Gulf 99 the abuse of especially the female lower-skilled workers. A typical element in the response operation is the preoccupation to find a temporary shelter and to ensure an urgent repatriation to India. And a negotiation effort with the employer is generally limited to secure a compensation for the victim. It is often a secondary concern to facilitate the victim to lodge a criminal complaint and to pursue justice.12 Thus, the sponsor-employer usually escapes with the least damage and perhaps only makes a pecuniary compensation payment (it is often the practice that he or she actually demands a payment in reverse for the ‘release’ of the withheld passport or penalty for not completing the contract period). There is limited law enforcement for the migrants, a tendency to criminalise the migrant in the GCC region (on the inadequacy of legal infrastructure in the region, see Mednicoff, 2011; Gardner et al., 2014). A very common explanation was also concern about the reputations of the female migrants by avoiding more public light. However, it works to institutionalise the letting off of the perpetrators with impunity while the victims remain the sufferers in any case. The activists projected the very presence of the female worker as the problem in the ‘avoidable’ territory of the Gulf countries.

Conclusion A focus on measures to protect the female migrant from exploitation has increased her vulnerability abroad, especially the low-skilled ones, as some evidence on the ground discussed in this chapter shows. It is particularly true when the protection function is overly privileged over the other functions like that of the empowerment of the female worker. Kodoth and Varghese (2012) have noted the expansion of irregular migration channels in India. This was a result of the process of migration via the regular channels becoming cumbersome owing to more restrictions. A few manifestations of the increasingly protectionist Indian emigration regime are the practice of the outcome of the ‘pushing’, where agents in collusion with the emigration officials manage to send out the female migrant at the ports of embarkment and the airports; and the development of parallel informal structures like the ‘Kasaragod embassy’ in Kerala – these are entities that the migrants sometimes actually preferred for being more easily accessible to spew out fake passport, visa and travel documents and other assistance (Pattadath and Moors, 2012). Oishi (2005) observes that the policy in the South Asian countries is coloured by the national self-identities that represent women to

100  Radhika Kanchana embody the national pride and dignity. They hence differentiate on gender, projecting women ‘as the victims of all sorts of violations and incapable of deciding on cross-border migration’. The society and the nation feel responsible to intervene for the protection and the control of women’s sexual purity. The conditions abroad like in the Gulf region are postulated as not being ‘appropriate for women’ to work – India uses this argument for (more) controls (Kodoth and Varghese, 2012): (This framing) turns the issue into one of female sexual security and, as a result, one of morality. . . . The easy conflation of a problem of exploitation (sexuality is an important aspect) with a problem over movement in the case of women belies an acknowledgement that women’s mobility is constantly under the social scanner and it takes us to unexamined assumptions that are at the core of patriarchy. The social and the policy norms thereby stress the transgressive element of a woman, who chooses to migrate alone and in a lower-skilled work. A female domestic worker’s migration is then a mobility carried with the burden of shame and guilt, with a tag of the potential for immorality. The choice of work is among the ‘indecent ways of moneymaking overseas’ and a deviation from the ‘dominant standards of sexual morality’ (Kodoth and Varghese, 2012). A female worker, who is potentially illegal, is an even more avoidable liability – the activists in the host territory (both the officials and the voluntary actors) responding to the abused victims often expressed it. The protective discourse is evidently contributing to discount the female migrant worker as also an agent, who has the capacity to make choices. The government justifies the protective restrictions13 to migrate by citing the practical ‘realities’, such as in the host territory of the Gulf countries, that put limits on its potential responsiveness to its citizens abroad. The migrants give a different feedback. The potential emigrants at home demand rights. For instance, respondents in Kozhikode were unhappy with the age restriction that delayed the opportunity to earn a livelihood and to improve their life condition in their productive age. The state policy and the public discourse are ‘completely at odds with the aspirations of emigrant domestic workers . . . it continues to be driven by the perception of emigrant domestic workers as victims’ (Kodoth and Varghese, 2012). And the migrants overseas demand rights and support. Some recent initiatives enforced by the Indian missions in the GCC region have meant a little improvement to

Vulnerability of Indian female migrants in Gulf 101 empower the migrant (e.g. demanding a greater accountability from the employer, including standard contract and provision for a cellular phone) although, like an activist in Bahrain bemoaned, they were very late in coming. However, coming to the rescue and often at the postabuse stage still dominates much of the present structure of support. A more facilitative state system, supportive of the mobility and of the rights of the female migrants, increases the potential for their better treatment abroad. It would also enable the migrants to cope with the potential challenges better and to achieve their migration goals. The ‘migrants’ vulnerability is affected not only by the labour conditions at the destination but also by their sense of entitlement and their notion of rights at the country of origin (Mora and Piper, 2011). The present emigration policy of India towards women is hence a restrictive rather than a facilitative strategy. It reflects the logic of paternalism. A freer and a more assured mobility reduces the exposure to abuse. More affirmative and institutional support is thus necessary, and it would also enhance the female migrants’ already important contribution to uplift their families and also to the national income (Chammartin, 2006). The Indian government could rise above prejudice beyond a paternalistic- and a morality-informed policy action, and cater equally to all of its citizens. It has begun to acknowledge the gaps in the current structure. It must listen more to the voices of and be considerate to the agency of the female migrants.

Notes 1 ‘Jobs Hope for Expat Wives’, GDN, 8 February 2009. 2 A few changes at least on paper – with Labour Market Regulatory Authority (LMRA) in Bahrain and perhaps in Kuwait. 3 Kuwait, Oman, the UAE, Qatar and Saudi Arabia have recently developed draft Standard Unified Contracts for domestic workers. 4 Other South Asian countries also replaced their colonial-era migration policies – Emigration Ordinance in 1982 by Bangladesh, Sri Lanka Bureau of Foreign Employment Act in 1985 by Sri Lanka, Foreign Employment Regulation in 2008 by Nepal and Emigration Ordinance in 1979 followed by National Emigration Policy in 2009 by Pakistan. 5 Located in Chandigarh, Chennai, Delhi, Ernakulam, Hyderabad, Kolkata, Mumbai, Thiruvananthapuram, Jaipur and Rae Bareilly. 6 Ten countries, namely Bangladesh, China, India, Indonesia, Nepal, Pakistan, the Philippines, Sri Lanka, Thailand and Vietnam, hold periodical ministerial-level consultations from 2003 to discuss the issues of optimising labour migration benefits via mainly information-sharing and cooperation. At the Dhaka Declaration in 2011, they committed to pay particular attention to address the specific needs and concerns of the vulnerable groups like the female workers.

102  Radhika Kanchana 7 India signed bilateral treaty on labour with Qatar (1985) and Saudi Arabia (2014), and MoUs with the UAE (2006), Kuwait (2007), Oman (2008) and Bahrain (2009). 8 ‘New Policy for Domestic Helps: Government Proposes Rs 9,000 Minimum Pay, Social Security Cover, Mandatory Leaves’, The Economic Times, 16 August 2015. 9 In one reported instance, a Filipino woman hired as a domestic worker was transferred to a relative’s house but in reality was sold into the flesh trade. 10 Another phenomenon called the temporary or muta’ marriages occurs in the site of the home country for instance, in Kerala (Arabi Kalyanam) and in Hyderabad (‘Sheikh marriages’), where the girls are usually abandoned soon after (Bindu and Sultana, 2008). 11 ILO 2013: 71, Box 3.12 – Blackmail within Marriage, Lebanon, 24 April 2012. 12 It is slowly changing, also with recent limited but positive legislation by some GCC countries, for instance, on trafficking. 13 The government extended ECR requirement to the nurses as well from April 2015 and their recruitment only by designated bodies, allegedly to curb malpractices by recruitment agencies.

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Vulnerability of Indian female migrants in Gulf 103 Gardner, A., S. Pessoa and L. Harkness. November 2014. Labour Migrants and Access to Justice in Contemporary Qatar. LSE Middle East. Harroff-Tavel, Hélène and Alix Nasri. 2007. Exported and Exposed: Abuses against Sri Lankan Domestic Workers in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Lebanon and the United Arab Emirates. New York: Human Rights Watch. Harroff-Tavel, Hélène and Alix Nasri. 2010. Slow Reform: Protection of Migrant Domestic Workers in Asia and the Middle East. New York: Human Rights Watch. Harroff-Tavel, Hélène and Alix Nasri. 2013. Tricked and Trapped: Human Trafficking in the Middle East. Geneva: International Labour Organisation. International Trade Union Confederation. 2014. Global Rights Index. Geneva: ITUC. Kalir, Barak and Malini Sur (eds). 2012. Transnational Flows and Permissive Polities: Ethnographies of Human Mobilities in Asia. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press. Khadria, Binod. 2010. ‘Paradigm Shifts in India’s Migration Policy towards the Gulf’, Middle East Institute Viewpoints: 67–69. Kodoth, Praveena and V.J. Varghese. 2011. ‘Emigration of Women Domestic Workers from Kerala: Gender, State Policy and the Politics of Movement’, Centre for Development Studies Working Paper 445. Kodoth, Praveena and V.J. Varghese. 2012a. ‘Emigration of Female Domestic Workers from Kerala: Gender, State Policy and the Politics of Movement’, in Barak Kalir and Malini Sur (eds), Transnational Flows and Permissive Politics: Ethnographies of Human Mobility in Asia, Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, pp. 169–188. Kodoth, Praveena and V.J. Varghese. 2012b. ‘Protecting Women or Endangering the Emigration Process: Emigrant Women Domestic Workers, Gender and State Policy’, Economic and Political Weekly XLVII(43): 56–65. Kumar, Anjali. 2014. ‘Migration Flows and Policies: India at a Turning Point’, Institut Francais des Relations Internationales (IFRI), E-Note. Leonard, Karen. 2002. ‘South Asian Women in the Gulf: Families and Futures Configured’, in Sonita Sarker and Esha Niyogi De (eds), Trans-status Subjects: Gender in the Globalization of South and Southeast Asia, Durham: Duke University Press, pp. 213–231. Longva, Anh Nga. 1999. ‘Keeping Migrant Workers in Check: The Kafala System in the Gulf’, Middle East Report 211. Manseau, Gwenann. 2006. ‘Contractual Solutions for Migrant Labourers: The Case of Domestic Workers in the Middle East’, Human Rights Law Commentary 2: 25–47. Mednicoff, David. 2011. ‘National Security and the Legal Status of Migrant Workers: Dispatches from the Arabian Gulf’, 33 W. New England Law Review 121: 121–162. Moors, A., R. Jureidini, F. Ozbay and R. Sibban. 2009. ‘Migrant Domestic Workers: A New Public Presence in the Middle East?’, in Seteney Shami (ed.), Publics, Politics and Participation: Locating the Public Sphere in the Middle East and North Africa, New York: Social Science Research Council.

104  Radhika Kanchana Mora, C. and N. Piper. 2011. ‘Notions of Rights and Entitlements among Peruvian Female Workers in Chile’, Diversities, UNESCO 13(1): 5–18. Oishi, Nana. 2005. Women in Motion: Globalization, State Policies, and Labor Migration in Asia. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press. Osella, Caroline and Filippo Osella. 2012. ‘Migration, Networks and Connectedness across the Indian Ocean’, in Mehran Kamrava and Zahra Babar (eds), Migrant Labor in the Persian Gulf, New York: Columbia University Press, pp. 105–136. Pattadath, Bindulakshmi and Annelies Moors. 2012. ‘Moving between Kerala and Dubai: Women Domestic Workers, State Actors and the Misrecognition of Problems’, in Barak Kalir and Malini Sur (eds), Transnational Flows and Permissive Poltics: Ethnographies of Human Mobility in Asia, Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, pp. 151–168. Percot, Marie. 2006. ‘Indian Nurses in the Gulf: Two Generations of Female Migration’, South Asia Research 26(1): 41–62. Percot, Marie and S. Irudaya Rajan. 2007. ‘Female Emigration from India: Case Study of Nurses’, Economic and Political Weekly XLII(4): 318–325. Sabban, Rima. 2002. ‘Migrant Women in the United Arab Emirates: The Case of Female Domestic Workers’, Series on Women and Migration, ILO GENPROM Working Paper No. 10. Strobl, Staci. 2009. ‘Policing Housemaids: The Criminalization of Domestic Workers in Bahrain’, The British Journal of Criminology 49(2): 165–183. Thimothy, Rakkee and Zakir Hussain. 2008. Managing International Labour Migration from India: Policies and Perspectives. New Delhi: International Labour Organisation. Thimothy, Rakkee and S.K. Sasikumar. 2012. Migration of Women Workers from South Asia to the Gulf. New Delhi: V.V. Giri National Labour Institute and UN Women South Asia Sub-Regional Office. Truong, T., D. Gasper, J. Handmaker and S. Bergh (eds). 2014. Migration, Gender and Social Justice: Perspectives on Human Insecurity, Hexagon Series on Human and Environmental Security and Peace, Vol. 9, Heidelberg, New York, Dordrecht, London: Springer. Truong, Thanh-Dam. 2012. ‘Gender in Transnational Migration: Rethinking the Human Rights Framework’, Migration and Development 1(1): 72–86. Varghese, V.J. and S. Irudaya Rajan. 2011. ‘Governmentality, Social Stigma and Quasi-Citizenship: Gender Negotiations of Migrant Women Domestic Workers from Kerala’, in S. Irudaya Rajan and Marie Percot (eds), Dynamics of Indian Migration: Historical and Current Perspectives, New Delhi: Routledge, pp. 224–250. Varia, N. 2011. ‘ “Sweeping Change?” A Review of Recent Reforms on Protections for Migrant Domestic Workers in Asia and the Middle East’, Canadian Journal of Women & the Law 23(1): 265–287. Zachariah, K.C. and S. Irudaya Rajan. 2012. Kerala’s Gulf Connection, 1998–2011: Economic and Social Impact of Migration. Hyderabad: Orient Black Swan.

Vulnerability of Indian female migrants in Gulf 105 Zachariah, K.C. and S. Irudaya Rajan. 2013, 2015. Trafficking in Persons Report. Washington, DC: Department of State. Zachariah, K.C. and S. Irudaya Rajan. 2014a. Exploited Dreams: Dispatches from Indian – Indian Migrant Workers in Saudi Arabia. Bangalore: Amnesty International. Zachariah, K.C. and S. Irudaya Rajan. 2014b. Facilitating Exploitation: A Review of Labour Laws for Migrant Domestic Workers in GCC Countries. Brussels: International Trade Union Confederation. Zachariah, K.C. and S. Irudaya Rajan. 2015. Indispensable Yet Unprotected: Working Conditions of Indian Domestic Workers at Home and Abroad. Geneva: International Labour Organisation.

8 Coming to Qatar A snapshot of the experience of Indian labour migrants Arjun S. Bedi, S. Irudaya Rajan and Ganesh Seshan Reports of the flagrant abuse of workers’ rights, charges of modern slavery and human trafficking and the difficult working and living conditions experienced by migrant workers from the Indian subcontinent who are working in the Gulf region, and in particular in Qatar, abound in the international press.1 This chapter is an attempt to place such debates, which have often been generated by newspaper reports and small-sample ethnographic work (e.g. Gardner, 2010), on a stronger empirical footing. As opposed to the bulk of the work in this area which focuses on low-income migrants (Kamrava and Babar, 2012; Gardner et al., 2013) and provides a perhaps narrow view, we adopt a broader lens and examine the experiences of a sample of about 450 migrants from India in Qatar. The data was gathered between January and May 2011 from a pool of migrants living and working in Doha and is representative of the Indian states from which the migrants originate. The chapter provides seriatim a socio-demographic profile of the migrants, highlights the manner and the cost of obtaining employment, examines variations between pre-migration and post-migration contractual agreements – a key marker of the charge of human trafficking, analyses the wage gains from migration and assesses working terms and conditions. We find that the majority of migrants (88 per cent) are male with an average age of 33. The bulk of them (85 per cent) have secondary education or more. Almost two-fifths are Muslim, while the rest follow other religions. The average migrant in our sample has been in the country for about six years. About 43 per cent did not sign a work contract before coming. Nevertheless, the bulk (95 per cent) are getting the wages they were promised. However, of those who signed contracts, 18 per cent were forced to sign new contracts on arrival. Delayed wage payments are uncommon, and about 90 per cent of the migrants indicate that they are paid on time. On average,

Coming to Qatar 107 a conservative estimate suggests that migrants earn about three times the wages they earned in their sending destinations. These averages hide sharp labour market segmentation as migrants with low monthly wages (less than or equal to QAR 2,000) are far more likely to be forced to sign new wage contracts on arrival (61 versus 2 per cent), experience payment delays (33 versus 5 per cent) and have their passports held by their employers (93 versus 36 per cent).2

Data and profile The data collection for this study was an initiative of the Centre for Development Studies in Trivandrum and was gathered between January and May 2011 by a team affiliated to Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service in Qatar. The objective was to obtain a sample that would be able to represent the average Indian migrant in the Gulf and yield information on labour market traits and outcomes before and after migration as well as shed light on the migration experience – both before and after. Based on information on emigrants requiring emigration clearance, obtained from the Ministry of Overseas Indian Affairs (MOIA), the relative share of the Indian states from which migrants originate was computed. The sample size, motivated by financial considerations, was set at 500 Indian migrants, with desired state-of-origin sample proportions based on the MOIA data.3 The questionnaire used for the study was designed and pretested on a group of migrant workers, after which face-to-face interviews were conducted. A convenience sample approach guided by the desired state-level sample proportions was conducted. The data collection team was encouraged to use social networks to reach out to various migrant communities. If the share of targeted individuals from a certain state was achieved, no additional individuals from that state were interviewed.4 The final sample was 455 individuals with a shortfall of migrants from Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan, which the fieldworkers had difficulty locating. It is hard to argue that such a sample which is constructed on the basis of state of origin of the migrant and convenience sampling yields a generalizable picture of the average Indian migrant in Qatar. However, at the very least it does provide a picture of the Indian migrant experience for a larger sample than other previous studies. For instance, Seshan (2013) works with a survey of 128 migrants conducted in 2007, of which 25 per cent were from India, and Gardner et al. (2013) work with a survey of 1,189 low-income migrants conducted in 2012, of which 30 per cent were from India. As we discuss

108  Bedi, Rajan and Seshan later, the profile that we obtain for workers earning less than QAR 2,000 is quite similar to that obtained by Gardner et al. (2013) whose survey is representative of low-income migrants in Qatar. Data was collected on the personal characteristics of the migrant. This included information on sex, religion, caste, state of origin, marital status, education and employment status. Information was also gathered on wages before and after migrating, the migration experience in terms of acquiring visas and employment contracts and postmigration labour market outcomes and treatment. Table 8.1 provides summary statistics, which yields the following portrait of Indian migrants in Qatar. On average, an Indian migrant is a young (33 years old) male (88 per cent). About two-thirds are married, but only half of the married migrants live with their families in Qatar. Most, about 85 per cent, have acquired secondary education

Table 8.1 A socio-demographic profile of Indian migrants in Doha, means (standard deviation) Male (%) Age Marital status: married (%) Education (%)   Primary or less   Below secondary  Secondary  Degree Religion (%)  Hindu  Muslim  Christian  Others State of origin (top six states, %)   Tamil Nadu  Kerala   Andhra Pradesh   Uttar Pradesh  Punjab  Bihar Years in Qatar Qatar is the first country of migration (%)

88 33 (7.2) 65 5.7 9.4 22.4 62.3 47.4 39 6.6 7.0 23.9 22.4 14.9 9.2 7.7 7.2 5.68 (5.21) 79

Source: Special Survey conducted by the Centre for Development Studies in Thiruvananthapuram at Qatar with the collaboration of Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service in Qatar. Note: Depending on the variable, the number of observations ranges between 455 and 457.

Coming to Qatar 109 or higher. About half are Hindus and about 40 per cent are Muslims. Although this is an outcome of the sampling approach, the migrants come from 12 Indian states, with the 3 South Indian states of Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Andhra Pradesh dominating the distribution. On average, the migrant pool has been in Doha for about six years, while the median stay is around four years. For the bulk of the migrants (about 80 per cent), Qatar is the first country to which they have migrated. Clearly, migrants in Qatar are far more educated as compared to the average Indian (gross secondary enrolment in 2011 was 69 per cent; see World Development Indicators); they are far more likely to be Muslims as compared to the overall Indian population (14.2 per cent according to Census 2011) and match the Indian population in terms of age distribution as 65 per cent of the migrants are less than 35 years. A comparison of the figures discussed here and those reported in Gardner et al. (2013) is remarkably similar. They found that nearly all the migrants were male, 49 per cent were Hindus, 37 per cent were Muslims, the average age of a migrant worker was 32 and 72 per cent were married. The average duration in Qatar was 5.5 years, with a median stay of four years, and 68 per cent were first-time migrants.5

Before migration The data set at our disposal provides useful information on the labour market status of migrants before they migrated and also on some elements of the migration process. Before migrating about 70 per cent of the migrants were employed and conditional on employment earned an average of about Rs 12,000 per month in their last job before migrating (Table 8.2). This figure is averaged over migrants who left the country at different times and is likely to be influenced by lower salaries for older migrants. To remove the influence of particularly early migrants, we also computed the figure by restricting the sample to more recent migrants. For instance, for those who have spent only one year in Doha, their average salary before leaving was Rs 13,472 (N = 18), and for those who left two years ago, the corresponding salary was Rs 14,954 (N = 44). The salary for migrants who left between three and four years ago was about Rs 11,500 per month. As standalone figures, these are perhaps not so useful. However, we will return to these when we discuss wage gains due to migration. The bulk (74 per cent) of the migrants are on a work visa which is linked to an employer. A small proportion are on a so-called free visa (7.9 per cent), which allows them to work for employers other than

110  Bedi, Rajan and Seshan Table 8.2 Before migration: labour market characteristics and contract conditions, mean (standard deviation) Employed (%) Monthly wages before migrating (rupees) N = 323 Visa type (%)   Work visa   Free visa   Tourist/visit visa Visa source (%)   Authorized recruiting agent   Unauthorized recruiting agent  Relatives/friends  Others Total expenditure incurred to come to Qatar (rupees) N = 324 Signed employment contract before departure (%) Language of contract – English (%), N = 265 Forced to sign new contract after arriving (%) N = 261 (restricted to those who had signed contract before departure) Same salary as promised at recruitment (%), N = 362

72 11,646 (7,465) 74 7.9 7.4 63 6.1 18.2 12.7 38,663 (36,368) 57.5 94 18 95

Source: Special Survey conducted by the Centre for Development Studies in Thiruvananthapuram at Qatar with the collaboration of Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service in Qatar. Note: Unless specified, the number of observations ranges between 450 and 457.

the original employer who sponsored their visa, and a similar percentage seem to be working on a tourist visa. About two-thirds have acquired their visa from an authorized recruiting agent and about 18 per cent through the help of family and friends. The total expenditure incurred in order to get to Doha was about two to three times the monthly salary in the last job before migrating. Only about three-fifths of the sampled migrants had signed a contract before leaving the country, and about 18 per cent of those who had signed a contract were forced to sign a new contract on arrival.6 Despite the proportion of migrants who signed a new contract, only a small share of migrants (5 per cent) reported that they were not getting the same salary as promised at the time of recruitment. We investigated (i) the link between signing a contract before departure and (ii) the link between being forced to sign a new contract and a range of migrant traits. While the estimates are not reported, the main findings are that older individuals are more likely to have signed contracts before departure and are also less likely to have been forced

Coming to Qatar 111 into signing new contracts. For the rest, there were no clear patterns between the various traits and the probability of signing a contract. However, with regard to signing a new contract, the clearest influence was the effect of the post-migration salary. While it may seem odd to include this variable in the specification, it should be thought of as a proxy for the skill level of the migrant worker, and the estimates clearly show that the higher the skill level of the migrant, the lower the probability of being forced into signing a new contract. While there is no clear threshold, the graphical relationship between the probability of signing a new contract and monthly wages suggests that for those with incomes above QAR 5,000, the probability of signing a new contract is close to zero (see Figure 8.1). The sharp difference is also shown in Table 8.4, which shows that the average salary for those who were forced to sign new contracts is QAR 1,485 versus QAR 6,200 for those who did not have to do so. Consistent with the role of skills in influencing this practice, the proportion of those with secondary education and more is only 16 per cent among those who were forced

.8 .6 .4 .2 0

Probability of signing a new contract

1

New contract and wages

0

5,000

10,000

15,000

Wages in the month preceding the survey Figure 8.1  Likelihood of signing new contract against wages Source: Special Survey conducted by the Centre for Development Studies in Thiruvananthapuram at Qatar with the collaboration of Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service in Qatar.

Table 8.3 After migration: labour market characteristics and contract conditions, mean (standard deviation) Nature of job (%)   Regular employment   Piece-wage casual worker Type of employer (%)   Public sector   Foreign/local firm   Qatari national   Indian firm Nature of workplace (%)  Office  Shop  Factory/workshop  Construction Hours of work per week Monthly wage in local currency (QAR) Monthly wage in Indian rupees (1 QAR = Rs 12.15 in April 2011) Delays in salary payment in the year preceding the survey Nominal wage gain (current monthly wages/wages before migration), N = 322 Wage gain (current monthly wages/wages before migration) – adjusting for inflation and restricted to those who migrated in the past five years, N = 235 Median wage gain if education is less than or equal to secondary, N = 88 Median wage gain if education is greater than secondary, N = 147 Employer provides accommodation (%) Employer provides subsidized food (%) Employer arranges transport to workplace (%) Employer bears medical expenses (%) Employer provides air ticket to go home (%) Employer paid for work permit (%) Employer keeps passport (%) Employer restricts movements (%) Accommodation (%)  Flat   Part of flat   Rented room   Room in a worker camp

96 3.5 18 69 5.9 5.9 42 7.7 5.3 28 49.4 (10.4) 5,508 (3,872) 66,929 (47,053) 10.3 7.76 3.59 3.17 3.83 79 35 86 93 96 93 49.5 17 29.8 21.3 15.1 33.4

Source: Special Survey conducted by the Centre for Development Studies in Thiruvananthapuram at Qatar with the collaboration of Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service in Qatar. Note: Unless specified, the number of observations ranges between 455 and 457.

Coming to Qatar 113 Table 8.4  Questionable practices: differences in means

Salary in QAR Secondary education (%) N Salary in QAR Secondary education (%) N Salary in QAR N Secondary education (%) N Salary in QAR Secondary education (%) N

Forced to sign new contract = 1

Forced to sign new contract = 0

1,485 15.6 51 Experienced delays in payments = 1 1,929 23.4 47 Passport retained by employer = 1 3,609 226 40.6 224 Restrictions on movement = 1 3,771 40.8 76

6,200 68.7 326 Experienced delays in payments = 0 5,905 67 407 Passport retained by employer = 0 7,382 229 83.4 231 Restrictions on movement = 0 5,851 66.6 378

Source: Special Survey conducted by the Centre for Development Studies in Thiruvananthapuram at Qatar with the collaboration of Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service in Qatar. Note: In all cases, differences in means were statistically different from each other at the 1 per cent level.

to sign new contracts and about 69 per cent among those who did not sign new contracts.

After migration The survey yields substantial information about the labour market conditions post-migration. The bulk of the migrants (96 per cent) are engaged in regular employment, and a majority work for private firms (69 per cent). A small but substantial proportion work for publicsector firms (18 per cent), while about 6 per cent work for Qatari nationals, presumably as domestic workers. About two-fifths are employed in an office, while 28 per cent work in construction. In terms of hours of work, the average workweek is close to 50 hours, with a substantial proportion (27 per cent) working more

114  Bedi, Rajan and Seshan

20 0

10

Percentage

30

40

than 60 hours per week (see Figure 8.2). On average, the maximum work effort is provided by those working for Qatari nationals (57 hours), while those working for the public sector work about 42 hours per week and their counterparts in private firms put in about 50 hours per week. In terms of the contribution of work effort by the nature of the workplace, the average hours of work range from about 45 hours per week for those who work in an office to about 59 hours for those who work in shops and factories and 55 hours per week for construction workers. If the norm for a workweek is 40 hours, clearly this is not being respected and those who are most likely to be the least paid (domestics, construction workers) are most likely to work longer hours as opposed to those working in offices. The average monthly wage for workers in the sample in the month preceding the survey was QAR 5,508 or Rs 66,929. The salary distribution is provided in Figure 8.3. About 23 per cent of the workers earn less than or equal to the low-income threshold of QAR 2,000, while about 37 per cent earn less than QAR 3,500 per month.7 Rather

10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60 65 70 75 80 85 90 95 100

Hours of work per week

Figure 8.2  Distribution of hours worked per week Source: Special Survey conducted by the Centre for Development Studies in Thiruvananthapuram at Qatar with the collaboration of Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service in Qatar.

36.92

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Coming to Qatar 115

7.912 4.615 .4396

0

.6593

2,000

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Wages in the month preceding the survey

Figure 8.3  Distribution of monthly wages (QAR) Source: Special Survey conducted by the Centre for Development Studies in Thiruvananthapuram at Qatar with the collaboration of Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service in Qatar.

than the absolute earnings, an issue which may be of more interest is the return to migration, at least to the extent that this may be gauged by post-migration wage gains. The nominal wage gain, that is, current monthly wages as a proportion of earnings in the last job in the country of origin, is about eight times. However, this is misleading as it does not account for wage gains which may have taken place in India if the individual had not migrated. To account for the effect of inflation, we use the consumer price index and inflate all pre-migration salaries to the level they may have been expected to if they kept pace with inflation and we also restrict comparisons to those who migrated in the past three years. These refinements yield an average wage gain of about 3.6 times the pre-migration wages. While these gains are larger for those with secondary education (3.83 times), even for those with lower levels of education (less than secondary) the gains are at least three times their pre-migration wages. For a majority of migrants, these wage gains are coupled with coverage of accommodation, medical expenses and to-and-fro air tickets.

116  Bedi, Rajan and Seshan These financial gains seem impressive; however, on the flip side, about 10 per cent of the migrants indicate that they have experienced delays in wage payments in the year preceding the survey, and 17 per cent indicate that their employer restricts their movements.8 One of the key aspects that has received attention in newspaper reports is passport retention. Our data shows that in almost 50 per cent of the cases, employers retain the passport of the migrant. Whether this is for safe-keeping, given that a large proportion of migrants (54 per cent) live in shared rooms and flats, or whether this is driven by pernicious reasons is not possible to determine.9 However, it does show that for almost half the migrants, employers are able to potentially control their ability to move to other employers as well as to return to India. To identify the groups that are more likely to experience such questionable practices, we successively estimate a series of probit regressions to examine the link between various migrant traits and labour market outcomes and (i) the probability of experiencing wage delays (ii) the probability that a migrant’s movements are restricted and (iii) the probability that passports are retained. The patterns are similar to those reported earlier. We find that in the case of wage delays, the single most important factor that influences delays is a migrant’s wages. After controlling for wage level, the education of the migrant, the type of employer and the nature of the workplace have no bearing. However, there is a systematic and statistically strong link between wage levels and delays with higher-wage migrants far less likely to experience delays as compared to those who are paid lower wages (see Figure 8.4). As shown in Table 8.4 the average monthly wages for those who experienced delays was QAR 1,929 as opposed to QAR 5,905 for those who did not experience any delays. In terms of restrictions to movements, the link between various traits and such restrictions is not very clear. While there is a still a wage effect – migrants with higher wages are less likely to experience any restrictions – the link is not as clear as in the case of outcomes such as signing new contracts or experiencing payment delays (see Table 8.4). With regard to passport retention, the analysis shows that the probability that an employer will keep a migrant’s passport is lower for those with higher wages although the relationship is not entirely linear and there are cases where passport retention also takes place among those with higher wages (see Figure 8.5). Educational distribution conditional on passport retention shows that educated migrants are far less likely to have their passports held by their employers (see Figure 8.6), and private firms – regardless of who owns the firm (local, Indian or nonIndian foreign owner) – are most likely to retain passports.

Coming to Qatar 117

Concluding remarks The analysis provided in this chapter yields a more nuanced picture of the employment conditions faced by Indian migrants as compared to press reports. This is perhaps not surprising, as reports produced by Amnesty International and newspapers such as The Guardian focus mainly on low-income migrants, while the data used for this chapter does not focus on any particular income or occupational category but was designed to reflect the state of origin of the migrants. The data collection was a focused effort and did not dwell on the living and working conditions of the workers. Despite this shortcoming, the data that we do have shows that there are substantial wage gains from migration – on average, migrants seem to be earning about three times their wages at destination. At the same time, except for passport retention by employers, the bulk of the workers were not forced to sign new contracts on arrival; they seem to be getting paid on time and do not experience restrictions on their movement.

.8 .6 .4 .2 0

Probability of wage delays

1

Delays and wages

0

5,000

10,000

15,000

20,000

25,000

Wages in the month preceding the survey

Figure 8.4  Likelihood of salary delays against wages Source: Special Survey conducted by the Centre for Development Studies in Thiruvananthapuram at Qatar with the collaboration of Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service in Qatar.

0

.2

.4

.6

.8

1

Probability that passport is with employer

Passport retention and wages

0

5,000

10,000

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Wages in the month preceding the survey

Figure 8.5  Likelihood of passport retention against wages Source: Special Survey conducted by the Centre for Development Studies in Thiruvananthapuram at Qatar with the collaboration of Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service in Qatar.

Passport retained by employer

40

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Passport retained by employee

Education level

Figure 8.6 Distribution of educational status conditional on passport retention status Source: Special Survey conducted by the Centre for Development Studies in Thiruvananthapuram at Qatar with the collaboration of Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service in Qatar.

Coming to Qatar 119 However, the sanguine picture sketched earlier tends to hide sharp differences. Consistent with the tenor of the newspaper reports, we find that there is a clear link between questionable work practices and the wage levels of workers. For instance, among low-income workers, that is, those earning less (more) than QAR 2,000 a month, we find that the employer passport retention rate is about 93 (36) per cent, the chances of being forced to sign a new contract post-migration is 61 (2) per cent and 33 (5) per cent of such workers experience delays in wage payments. The threshold of QAR 2,000 is arbitrary and is based on Gardner’s (2010) ethnographic work and should not be viewed too strictly. However, the main point from these figures and the analysis presented in the chapter is quite clear – migrants who command the lowest wages in Qatar are most likely to experience violations of their rights. In our sample, about 23 per cent of workers earned less than QAR 2,000 and about half earned less than QAR 4,000.10 To place matters in perspective, consider that in the first quarter of 2015, non-Qatari workers constituted 94 per cent of the country’s economically active population of 1.8 million workers and workers from India accounted for about 30 per cent of these non-Qatari workers (De Bel-Air, 2014).11 While information on the number of Indian migrants by occupation is not available, the bulk of migrant workers, close to 80 per cent of non-Qataris, tend to work in relatively lowwage occupations (Qatar Statistical Authority, 2011), and even if only half the Indian migrant workers are employed in such occupations, then it is clear that large numbers of Indian migrants are likely to face egregious situations.

Notes 1 Most notably, in a series of articles The Guardian newspaper has written about the condition of workers employed to build stadiums for the football World Cup expected to take place in Qatar in 2022. See http://www. theguardian.com/world/2013/sep/25/revealed-qatars-world-cup-slaves (accessed 22 July 2015). In addition, see http://timesofindia.indiatimes. com/india/279-migrant-Indian-workers-died-in-Qatar-last-year-Amnestyreport-says/articleshow/47491515.cms (accessed 22 November 2015). 2 This threshold is based on a cut-off used by Gardner et al. (2013). One US dollar is the equivalent of QAR 3.65. Based on ethnographic work conducted in Qatar, they argue that a threshold of QAR 2,000 per month divides unskilled/low-skilled workers and semi-skilled workers. 3 The MOIA proportions were derived from a ranking of 11 states with the highest proportion of emigrants – constituting 95 per cent of all emigrant flows. The ranking was based on five-year averages of the share of emigrants requiring emigration clearance from each Indian state between 2005 and 2009 in order to smooth year-to-year variations in the annual shares. The resulting 11 states were Uttar Pradesh, Kerala, Tamil Nadu,

120  Bedi, Rajan and Seshan Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Rajasthan, Punjab, West Bengal, Maharashtra, Karnataka and Gujarat. 4 The MOIA data on emigrants requiring clearance is likely to better reflect the flows of low-skilled or unskilled workers. No reliable data exists on the flows of skilled migrants. For the purpose of this study, both blue- and white-collar workers were interviewed. 5 In both data gathering efforts, it was hard to access those working as domestics. This is, in part, likely to be responsible for the high proportion of males in the sample. 6 While the profile of the migrants is similar to that in Gardner et al. (2013), other aspects are somewhat different. In our sample, 57.5 per cent of migrants had signed a contract before coming to Qatar, while in the data set used by Gardner et al. (2013), the corresponding figure is 44 per cent. In our sample, 18 per cent of those who had signed a contract were forced to sign a new contract on arrival. If we restrict ourselves to those earning less than QAR 2,000 a month, the proportion of those who signed a new contract is 61 per cent, while it is 78 per cent in Gardner et al. (2013). While there are differences in these figures, they do highlight the point that it is the lower-income groups that are more likely to be forced to sign new contracts. 7 Among the low-income workers the average wage in our sample is QAR 1,177, with a standard deviation of 356. Gardner et al. (2013) report a similar average wage of around QAR 1,200 for Indian low-income migrants. 8 Gardner et al. (2013) report that 21 per cent of their respondents experienced payment delays (sometimes, never or rarely received payments on time). In our sample for those earning less than QAR 2,000, the corresponding figure is 33 per cent. 9 Gardner et al. (2013) report that in their case 90 per cent of the survey respondents mentioned that their passports were with their employers. In our survey, for those earning less than QAR 2,000, the corresponding figure is 93 per cent. For those earning more than QAR 2,000, the figure is 36 per cent. 10 According to a labour force survey report produced by the Qatar Statistical Authority, in 2011, the average monthly wage in 80 per cent of the jobs engaged in by non-Qataris was less than QAR 4,000. See Qatar Statistical Authority (2011), Table 19. 11 According to the latest available labour force statistics, in the first quarter of 2015, non-Qataris accounted for 94 per cent of Qatar’s economically active population (15 years and above) of 1.8 million workers. See http:// www.qix.gov.qa/portal/page/portal/ (accessed 23 November 2015).

References De Bel-Air, Françoise. 2014. ‘Demography, Migration, and Labour Market in Qatar’, European University Institute and Gulf Research Center, Explanatory Note No. 8. Gardner, Andrew. 2010. ‘Engulfed: Indian Guest Workers, Bahraini Citizens and the Structural Violence of the Kafala System’, in Nicholas De Genova

Coming to Qatar 121 and Nathalie Peutz (eds), The Deportation Regime: Sovereignty, Space, and Freedom of Movement, Durham, NC: Duke University Press, pp. 305–349. Gardner, Andrew, S. Pessoa, A. Diop, K. Al-Ghanim, K. Le Trung and L. Harkness. 2013. ‘A Portrait of Low-Income Migrants in Contemporary Qatar’, Journal of Arabian Studies 3(1): 1–17. Kamrava, Mehran and Zahra Babar (eds). 2012. Migrant Labour in the Persian Gulf. New York: Columbia University Press. Qatar Statistical Authority, Bulletin Labour Force Statistics. 2011. Labour Force Survey Report. http://www.qix.gov.qa/portal/page/portal/qix/subject_area/ Publications?subject_area=183. Seshan, Ganesh. 2013. ‘Migrants in Qatar: A Socio-economic Profile’, Journal of Arabian Studies 2(2): 157–171.

9 Tamil emigrants in the United Arab Emirates Chitra Ranganathan

India is a major player in the global workforce and has the second-largest overseas community with an estimated 25 million Indians spread across more than 11 countries. Following the oil boom in the 1970s, the Gulf saw a surge of workers from India. There were approximately 6 million Indians living and working in the Gulf in 2013, according to Government of India estimates. India received remittances of US$64 billion in 2011 and holds the record of being the largest remittance-receiving country in the world (Irudaya Rajan, 2014). The Gulf countries have developed into prosperous, modern economies mainly due the easy availability of ‘cheap’ skilled, semi-skilled and manual workers from the Indian subcontinent. Geographical proximity has contributed significantly to labour mobility in the region. The quest for greener pastures is the major factor driving migration. A combination of ‘push’ and ‘pull’ factors motivate people to move.

Motivation Over the years, international migration has grown in scale, complexity and impact. Though a vast amount of empirical work has been done on subjects such as rural–urban migration, international migratory movements and the process of assimilation of the migrants in the host country, there is need for a proper evaluation of the impact of migration on the social practices of the migrants. Their experiences are quite unique in that they come from different cultures and backgrounds, belong to different religions, speak different languages and have varying educational levels, skills and attitudes. The exposure of the migrants to a new way of life in the host country has several social consequences. It is therefore important to examine how or if relocation to another country has impacted the socio-cultural practices of the migrant community and the extent to which the migrants

Tamil emigrants in the United Arab Emirates 123 have adapted to ways of life in the social setting of the destination country. The main reason why migration attracts a lot of attention at research and policy levels is that it has far-reaching social, political and economic implications and contributes to economic development in both the sending country and the host country. The Gulf has enjoyed a tremendously sustained growth in productivity over the past three decades. A major underlying reason for this has been the easy availability of an educated, skilled and at the same time cheap workforce. The proximity of the Gulf to talent-rich regions such as the Indian subcontinent, Egypt and the Levant has facilitated the inflow of workers from these regions to the Gulf. Life in the Gulf has impacted all aspects of the lives of the migrants. Accordingly, this study analyses the patterns and trends of Indian migration in the Gulf countries on the basis of several factors – the socio-economic and educational background of the migrants, their religion, culture and family structure, their occupational status and the effect that migration has on them and their families. The majority of migrants from India to the Gulf region are from Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Kerala, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Gujarat. Studies on Gulf migration from India are limited in number and focus mainly on migration from Kerala. There is little information on migrants from other states. In this context, this chapter looks at the trends and patterns of Gulf migration among migrants from Tamil Nadu.

Literature review Much of the research on international migration has focused on the push and pull factors and the consequences of migration on the sending and receiving countries. The impact of Gulf migration on the sending and receiving countries has been the subject of several studies. Leela Gulati (1983) looked at the impact of male migration from India to the Gulf on the family, examining regional trends and how remittances improved the standard of living of the family of the migrant in the home country. Oommen (1989) examined the effect of the brain drain and observed that the migration of talented Indians exposed three basic value orientations – acute individualism, intense nationalism and professional commitment. Albert Hourani (1991) stated that migrant workers in the oil-producing countries might earn more than they would in their home country, but lacked security and had no way of improving their plight by concerted action. Premi and Mathur (1995) discuss India’s

124  Chitra Ranganathan demographic and socio-cultural setting in terms of population growth, urbanization, patterns of internal migration, growth of the labour force, economic growth, poverty alleviation, health and education. They lament the lack of data on international migration in the country. The study predicted that migration to the Gulf countries would continue. Zachariah and Irudaya Rajan (2012) observe that migration from Kerala to other states of India and to other countries has become so rampant that its impact is felt in every aspect of life in the state – economic, social, political and even religious. It is obvious that the migration phenomenon can be understood only as a social process across all disciplines (Fischer and Straubhaar, 1996). The underlying reason for migration from Kerala is the economic benefits it offers, and the improved economic status of the households is reflected in their consumption standards, quality of housing and income levels. From the policy point of view, India has much to learn from the Philippines (Irudaya Rajan and Mishra, 2010). This study points out that the government of the Philippines retains a regulatory role over temporary labour migration to foreign countries, though most of the responsibility for recruiting workers is entrusted with the private sector with a view to protecting workers from abuse and discouraging illegal recruitment. The government provides international migrants with several benefits including pre-migration training, life insurance, pensions and loan facilities.

Methodology Dubai is a booming metropolis located at the southern end of the Persian Gulf in the Arabian Peninsula and is the most dynamic city in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). Indians constitute about 60 per cent of the workforce in the Gulf and 24 per cent are from Tamil Nadu. This study describes the demographic and occupational structure of Tamil migrants in the Gulf region, specifically Dubai. It examines the work status, educational background and socio-economic characteristics of Tamil migrants in Dubai and how migration had impacted their lives and that of their families. The study sample comprised Tamil migrants from Tamil Nadu, India, who were skilled workers who had completed a five-year residency in Dubai along with their families. The respondents were chosen based on the snowball sampling method. Primary data, both quantitative and qualitative, was collected via an interview schedule from 60 Tamil migrants during the period from December 2010 to

Tamil emigrants in the United Arab Emirates 125 March 2011. The researcher also interviewed migrant workers who were staying alone but previously had their families with them. The data was collected through various Tamil organizations functioning in Dubai. Prior to the actual field survey, a pilot study was carried out to finalize the questionnaire and include only questions that were relevant. The respondents were informed in advance about the purpose of the study and also assured that confidentiality of individual responses would be maintained. Secondary data required for the study was collected from various reports published by the Centre for Development Studies, Trivandrum, and online sources.

Analysis and discussion By 2009, the number of foreign nationals living and working in the UAE represented 85 per cent of the country’s 6 million inhabitants. Perhaps it is security concerns that prompt the national media to use euphemistic glosses such as ‘demographic imbalance’ to describe this situation, rather than citing statistics. Such glosses not only obscure the size of the foreign population but also blur the fact that there are several categories of migrants. The UAE has several types of migrant communities, each of which has quite specific characteristics. Highly skilled Indians have migrated to the developed countries through the ‘employment gate’ as well as via the ‘academic gate’. Growing pools of revolving students form a distinct set of actors among the Indian migrants – the ‘semi-finished human capital’ of Indian professionals working abroad (Majumdar, 1994; Abella, 2006).

Tamil migrants in Dubai The Gulf region has witnessed dramatic changes in the wake of the oil boom that has influenced the life of the migrants. High revenues from oil exports resulted in higher standards of living. Education and health services improved, construction boomed in the suburbs and new cities emerged in the middle of the desert (Irudaya Rajan and Mishra, 2010). The study of changing family structure is to properly assess the social process (Murray, 1980). The family as a social institution has always been regarded as an element to reckon with in the development of the individual as well as the society and state. Migration to the Gulf has brought about various changes that have impacted the family structure of the migrants. Indian white-collar workers and professionals comprise only about 30 per cent of the Indian workforce in the

126  Chitra Ranganathan Gulf countries, the rest being semi-skilled and unskilled workers. The contract period for skilled workers is two years, after which it can be renewed by the employer. Only skilled workers with a minimum income of 5,000 dirhams a month (Rs 60,000) are allowed to have their families reside with them in company-provided housing. Women are not allowed to sponsor spouses or children except if they are employed in fields such as medicine and the teaching profession. Therefore, most migrant families living in the UAE are nuclear and patriarchal, with one or two wage earners, and sometimes with children, who regardless of whether or not they are born in the UAE retain their parents’ nationality. This analysis is restricted to examining the demographics of Tamil migrants staying with their families in Dubai. The respondents are married and include those with and without children. They are employed in different fields such as advertising, marketing, information technology, education, human resources, administration, management and media. Their income levels allowed them to have their families with them.

Age and gender analysis of skilled migrants In this study, up to 45 per cent of the respondents were in the 51- to 60-year age group. They were skilled workers with professional qualifications who had migrated 10–15 years ago. Workers in the age group of 41–50 years and 31–40 years comprised about 38 and 17 per cent of the respondents, respectively. In general, it can be assumed that the proportion of older expatriate workers in the UAE has increased since 2010 due to the raising of the retirement age from 60 to 65 (Leigh, 2010). Until a few decades ago, women generally travelled short distances, while long-distance migration was a male prerogative. The gender ratio of migrants has changed over time and among countries, with some countries sending men and also women (Donato, 1992). In this study, up to 88 per cent of the migrants were male. About 45 per cent of the male migrants were in the 51- to 60-year age group, and about 38 and 17 per cent were in the 41- to 50-year age group and 31- to 40-year age groups, respectively. The proportion of women in the 51–60 and 41–50 age groups was similar at 42 per cent, with the remaining 14 per cent in the 31- to 40-year age group.

Educational background The migration rate is considerably higher among people who are educated than among those with low educational qualifications. This

Tamil emigrants in the United Arab Emirates 127 means that individuals with post-school/tertiary qualifications are more inclined to migrate than those who do not have these qualifications. Of the 60 respondents, 52 had professional educational qualifications and were doctors, engineers or chartered accountants. Only eight respondents had an arts and science education. There were significant differences among the male and female respondents with regard to professional qualifications. Only around 10 per cent of the women held professional qualifications. More male migrants (75 per cent) also held an arts and science education. Overall, the picture is one of a preponderance of male migrants holding a professional qualification.

Occupational distribution Occupation and educational qualifications are closely linked. People with professional qualifications and technical skills tend to migrate more than those without these attributes. Unemployed people are more likely to consider migration than those who are employed. Likewise, those who are not participants in the paid labour force would be least inclined to consider migration. The subjects of this study were skilled migrants who came from the state of Tamil Nadu and were working in Dubai. About one-third of the migrants were in the ‘other occupations’ category and worked as chartered accountants, and in executive and administrative positions in government and private organizations. Over 28 per cent were engineers in oil companies and 10 per cent were teachers in colleges. Doctors and nurses comprised 8 and 7 per cent of the sample, respectively. The share of migrants who were working as lawyers and engaged in trade and commerce was the same at 3 per cent.

Monthly income More than half of the respondents (55 per cent) earn a monthly salary of Rs 1.5–3 lakhs, one-fourth (26.7 per cent) earn less than Rs 1.5 lakhs a month and 11 per cent earn over Rs 3.1 lakhs a month. Earning capacity, as seen in Table 9.1, is the highest in the 41- to 50-year age group comprising engineers in oil companies and a few doctors, with about half getting an income of Rs 3.1 lakhs and above. One-third of the respondents in the 41- to 50-year age category were in the nursing profession or doing business and earned between 1.5 and 3 lakhs. One-fourth of the respondents in the 31- to 40-year age category worked in schools and earned less than Rs 1 lakh a month.

128  Chitra Ranganathan Table 9.1  Monthly income of Tamil migrants by age in Dubai Age of the respondent

Monthly income (rupees) Less than 1 lakh

1.5–3 lakhs

3.1 lakhs and above

31–40

 4  25.0%  6  37.5%  6  37.5%  16 100%

 6  18.2%  11  33.3%  16  48.5%  33 100%

 0  0%  6  54.5%  5  45.5%  11 100%

41–50 51–60 Total

Total

 10  16.7%  23  38.3%  27  45.0%  60 100%

Source: Survey conducted by the author.

Males predominate in all the categories, while there are no women with income levels less than Rs 1 lakh. Most of the women are in the Rs 1.5–3 lakh category and working as either teachers or nurses. It is obvious that earning capacity is the highest among those with professional qualifications. Moreover, Dubai is an attractive destination for nurses and teachers, in terms of both income and working conditions.

Working conditions Occupation, income and nature of work have a major impact on the lifestyle of migrants in Dubai. Most of the migrants in the present study reported that the environment at work was hygienic and comfortable. About half of the respondents worked late into the evening. The small proportion that worked night shifts (18 per cent) and continuous shifts (5 per cent) was mostly engineers in oil companies and nurses.

Employment status Up to 88 per cent of the respondents reported that they had achieved occupational prestige and that society held them in high esteem because they were well placed. Job satisfaction was high among the majority of the migrants. Only half of the respondents felt that their job was commensurate with their educational qualifications and experience. However, about 70 per cent mentioned job insecurity as a major issue. The working environment also posed issues for many, as Table 9.2 shows.

Tamil emigrants in the United Arab Emirates 129 Table 9.2  Influence of working environment among Tamil migrants Influence of working condition

Highly affected

Less affected

Not affected

Total

Health Family atmosphere Religious faith Attitude

  6 (10%) 45 (75%)

12 (20%)   5 (8.3)

42 (70%) 10 (16.7%)

60 (100%) 60 (100%)

42 (70%) 21 (35%)

  0 (0%) 14 (23.3%)

18 (30%) 25 (41.7%)

60 (100%) 60 (100%)

Source: Survey conducted by the author.

Nearly half of the respondents felt that the environment at work had negatively impacted their religious faith and family life. As a result, over 80 per cent reported that they were looking to move to other countries in the future.

Reasons for migration Migration is usually driven by factors such as the wage differences between the destination country and the home country, poor living conditions, political or religious persecution, war and natural disasters. However, these conditions did not apply in the case of these migrants who were mostly from the southern districts of Tamil Nadu like Dindigul, Madurai, Kanyakumari, Thanjavur, Theni, Tirunelveli and Trichy. An equal percentage – 23 per cent – reported that their decision was driven by ‘advice of friends’ and the ‘availability of better opportunities’. A few were motivated by ‘good salary’. Further, while friends’ advice and the quest for better career opportunities played a major role in inspiring the 51- to 60-year age group, relatives’ suggestion and self-motivation were cited as the reason for migration among a large proportion of those in the 41- to 50-year age group. Up to 29 per cent of those in the 31- to 40-year age group cited friends’ advice as the main reason for their coming to Dubai. The gender-wise picture reveals that most of the men were influenced by better career opportunities and relatives and friends working in Dubai, while the women migrated through their marriage or their professional skills. The analysis reveals that the respondents were motivated to migrate to Dubai not on account of better financial prospects but by the desire to improve career opportunities and by their relatives living in Dubai and other UAE nations.

130  Chitra Ranganathan The majority of the respondents had been living in Dubai for five to ten years. Many had worked in other countries in the Gulf and had moved to Dubai to better their financial and career prospects. Over 90 per cent of those who had worked in Saudi Arabia cited ‘unfriendly working environment’ as the reason for leaving. The family members of 70 per cent of the respondents had also migrated to other Gulf nations as well as the United States and the United Kingdom.

Family structure, culture and religious practices The study of family structure is the study of social process (Murray, 1980). Most of the respondents in this study were married and their families were nuclear. Up to 42 per cent of the migrants were from joint families, and this proportion fell to 5 per cent after they moved to Dubai. So migration had led to a decrease in family size. At the same time, a significant proportion (42 per cent) of the respondents had two dependents, while 28 per cent had one dependent. Working couples with dependents struggled to balance family life and professional life. Residing in Dubai had a major impact on their lifestyle in terms of their day-to-day activities, food patterns, mode of dress, socialization and even religious practices. For many, it was a shift from a traditional culture to a modern, Westernized one. In fact, up to 97 per cent of the respondents (mostly male and in the younger age groups) confirmed that migration to Dubai had changed their lifestyle.

The Western influence The Western influence was evident in the matter of education and the dietary pattern. Over 90 per cent of the respondents and their family members confirmed that living in Dubai had changed their lifestyle. The changes were manifest in the shift to a Western pattern of education and a Westernized diet, with more of poultry and other meats replacing the traditional vegetarian-inclined diet. The majority of the migrants were accepting about these changes and felt that it had a positive influence on their children and family in general.

Impact on religious faith Compared to the other emirates in the UAE, Dubai has a liberal attitude towards other faiths, and Hindus, Christians and Sikhs are free to fulfil their religious obligations and celebrate their festivals subject to certain restrictions.

Tamil emigrants in the United Arab Emirates 131

Conclusion More than half of the Tamil migrants who were the subject of this study were in the 31- to 50-year age group, mostly male, and had been in Dubai for five to ten years. These skilled workers hailed from the southern districts of Tamil Nadu. They had come to work in Dubai on the advice of their relatives and friends. Some had worked in other Gulf countries and had come to Dubai to better their financial prospects. Before migrating to Dubai, most said that they had been underemployed and in occupations that were not commensurate with their qualifications. Migration had a significant impact on the migrants as well as their families. Most of the respondents belonged to the Brahmin community. Their lifestyle had undergone major changes with migration with regard to food patterns, everyday activities, mode of dressing, religious practices, variations in working hours and so on. The Western influence was evident, especially among the children, and by and large, the families of the migrants approved of these changes. In a work-based society, the status and identity of an individual is evaluated in terms of the rewards that accompany particular occupational roles. The present study focused on skilled workers who had migrated from Tamil Nadu to Dubai. Many of the respondents were doctors, engineers and top-level executives enjoying internationally competitive salary rates. They reported that they were satisfied with the better employment, savings and lifestyle opportunities that resulted from migration to Dubai. Migration allowed them to develop their professional and communication skills and adapt to modern technology, and to provide their children with better facilities in terms of education, even sending them to the West for higher studies. Better employment opportunities, career prospects and higher standard of living were the main reasons for migration. The respondents in this study were skilled migrants, doctors and multinational company executives from the upper strata of society in the sending country. One of the major attractions that Dubai holds for migrants is the tax-free salary, meaning a higher disposable income per capita, enhanced saving capacity and added perks such as free housing, schooling allowances, club membership, medical insurance and an annual travel allowance. The respondents liked working in this emirate as it afforded them a level of comfort and even luxury that they would not have had back in India. Though the official language is Arabic, English is widely used and standard in the business community. Most of the local population can

132  Chitra Ranganathan converse in English, making it easier for the expatriate community to deal with and do business with them. The respondents said that living and working in Dubai had opened up new opportunities such as being able to interact with valuable international experience and the opportunity to work in world-class projects, allowing them to gain new skills to further their career prospects.

References Abella, M. 2006. ‘Global Competition for Skilled Workers and Consequences’, in C. Kuptsch and E.F. Pangs (eds), Competing for Global Talent, International Institute for Labour Studies, Geneva: ILO, pp. 11–32. Donato, Katherine. 1992. ‘Understanding US Immigration: Why Some Countries Send Women and Others Send Men’, in D. Gabbacia (ed.), Seeking Common Ground: Female Immigration to the United States, Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, pp. 159–184. Fischer, P.A. and T. Straubhaar. 1996. Migration and Economic Integration in the Nordic Common Labour Market, Nord No. 1996:2ISBN92-9120-7373248 pp. Copenhagen, Denmark: Nordic Council of Ministers. Gulati, Leela. 1983. ‘Impacts of Male Migration to the Middle East on the Family: Some Evidence from Kerala’, Economic and Political Weekly 18(52 and 53): 2217–2219. Hourani, Albert. 1991. A History of the Arab People. London: Faber and Faber. Irudaya Rajan, S. and U.S. Mishra. 2010. ‘Managing Migration from India: Lessons from the Philippines’, Chapter 13, in S. Irudaya Rajan (ed.), Governance and Labour Migration: India Migration Report 2010, New Delhi: Routledge, pp. 288–305. Leigh, Karen. 2010. ‘Update: Retirement Age in UAE Raised from 60 to 65 in Labour Law Changes’. http://www.arabianbusiness.com/update-retirementage-in-uae-raised-from-60-65-in-labour-law-changes-370402.html. Accessed 8 September 2015. Majumdar, T. 1994. ‘Old World Is the New World’, The Telegraph, 8 August, Calcutta. Murray, C. 1980. ‘Migrant Labour and Changing Family Structure in the Rural Periphery of Southern Africa’, Journal of Southern African Studies 6(2): 139–156. Oommen, T.K. 1989. ‘India: “Brain Drain” or the Migration of Talent?’, International Migration 27(3): 411–425. Premi, M.K. and M.D. Mathur. 1995. ‘Emigration Dynamics: The Indian Context’, International Migration 33(3–4): 627–666. Zachariah, K.C. and S. Irudaya Rajan. 2012. A Decade of Kerala’s Gulf Connection. New Delhi: Orient Blackswan.

10 Protection of labour migrants at destination countries A note on the Indian Community Welfare Fund T.L.S. Bhaskar And helping people migrate safely so they can pursue opportunities.1

Protecting migrants’ rights and providing requisite welfare, especially at destination countries, have become prominent measures in assessing the proactiveness of countries of origin (COO) like India in addressing the welfare concerns of migrant workers. The issue of welfare becomes even more critical to migrants who are on a temporary contract and have meagre chance of becoming naturalized citizens of countries of destination (COD). This is true in the case of millions of labour migrants in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). The issue of welfare has also been central to discussions at the Colombo Process,2 a major platform for collaboration among major sending countries, and has a dialogue with the COD. Welfare is also at the heart of various ILO Conventions, including Convention No. 97 on Migration for Employment (Revised) 1949, Convention No. 143 on Migrant Workers (Supplementary Provisions), 1975, and Convention No. 181 on Private Employment Agencies, 1997. Welfare of labour migrants becomes imminent in view of raising exploitation of contractual workers, both during recruitment and at work for various reasons. In spite of contractual obligation on the part of the foreign employer to ensure safety and well-being of the migrant workers, many overseas Indian workers continued to be duped by intermediaries both in India and in destination countries, due to their vulnerable situation. The situation turns murkier also due to the prevailing contract systems such as the Kafala, leading to runaway workers and maids. It becomes both a responsibility and an obligation on the part of the country of origin, India, to intervene through Indian missions and posts and safeguard the interests of its citizens.

134  T.L.S. Bhaskar

Welfare at all stages of migration cycle In the Indian context, migration is a choice that an individual citizen of India exercises. While migration is neither promoted nor prevented, the Ministry of Overseas Indian Affairs (MOIA), the lead ministry on all matters pertaining to international migration from India, enables that the choice is exercised in an informed manner. In the process, the ministry adheres to established good practices made available by multilateral and intergovernmental conventions. Social Security Agreements and bilateral labour memorandums of understanding are one such set of instruments. This is aimed at ensuring safe and legal migration, ensuring easy and equitable access to emigration opportunities and strengthening infrastructure and institutional mechanisms necessary to ensure the well-being of migrants. The respect for rights of the migrants and the need to empower them are critical to any framework, especially in respect of vulnerable categories like unskilled or semi-skilled workers and women migrant workers, and those under the Emigration Clearance Required (ECR) category, and they constitute a large component of the 25-million-strong overseas Indian community. The emigration trends under the ECR category alone stand at an annual average of 800,000 workers. For migrants under the ECR category, the ministry over the years had introduced multiple measures of protection at all stages of the migration cycle, as shown in Figure 10.1. Although most of the interventions focused on information dissemination through media campaigns, Migration Resource Centres (MRCs),3 Overseas Workers Resource Centre (OWRC)4 and the Indian Workers Resource Centre (IWRC), the ministry also recognized providing of welfare, both at origin and at destination, as essential in its attempts to make the migration process safe, legal and humane. The recently introduced online portal and grievance registration and monitoring system, MADAD,5 also aims at welfare and contributes to fast track grievance redressal in a stipulated response time. This initiative complements the alreadyexisting Grievance Redressal Mechanism and Transportation of Mortal Remains6 at the ministry. Finally, two noteworthy schemes aimed at holistic welfare of labour migrants are the Indian Community Welfare Fund (ICWF) and the Mahatma Gandhi Pravasi Suraksha Yojana, the second one providing elements of savings, pension and insurance in one scheme. Likewise, most of the countries in the Colombo Process have also introduced migrant welfare funds over the years, making a basket of services available to both migrants and their families. Table 10.1

Country

Bangladesh (1990)

India (2009)

S. No.

1.

2.

Services available

Target beneficiaries

1. Migrant Wages Earners’ 1. Transporting mortals/dead bodies and providing workers Welfare Fund local burials costs 2. Families8 (WEWF)7 2. Disbursement of money as death compensation/ regular dues/insurance/service benefit for the family of migrant of the dead wage earners workers 3. Pre-departure briefing back home 4. Scholarships for children 5. Other services such as welfare desks, safe homes, disabled/sick financial assistance, distress management and IT services 1. Overseas 1. Providing initial legal assistance to the deserving Indian Indian Community Indians, air tickets to stranded Indians, extending citizens in Welfare Fund medical care to Indians who are in need, boarding distress (ICWF) and lodging for distressed overseas Indian workers in household/domestic sectors and unskilled labourers 2. Providing assistance for incidentals and for airlifting the mortal remains to India or local cremation/burial of the deceased Indians, if the family is unable to meet 3. Providing the payment of penalties and fines, in respect of Indian nationals in jails and detentions centres or undocumented migrants 4. Providing support to local overseas Indian associations to establish overseas Indian community centres in countries that have population of overseas Indians exceeding 100,000 and to start and run overseas Indian community-based student welfare centres in countries that have more than 20,000 Indian students

Name of the fund

Table 10.1  Major welfare funds in some of the Colombo Process countries

(Continued)

1. Service charge that is levied by Indian missions and posts on passport, visa and consular services 2. Donations by Indian associations 3. Initial support by Ministry of Overseas Indian Affairs (MOIA)

1. Mandatory membership contributions of migrant workers 2. Investment and interest income on these funds 3. Income from other sources

Sources of fund

Country

Philippines (1995)9

S. No.

3.

Services available

Target beneficiaries

Sources of fund

1. Membership Overseas 1. Social benefits: disability and dismemberment, death 1. Overseas contributions of Filipino Workers and burial benefits foreign employers, workers Welfare 2. Country-specific Pre-Departure Orientation land-based and sea(OFWs) Administration Seminar (PDOS) and Comprehensive Pre-Departure based workers 2. Dependents (OWWA)10 Education Program (CPDEP) 2. Investment of OFWs 3. Scholarships, training and incentive programmes 3. Interest income and a. Scholarship and incentive programmes for OFWS/ income from other seafarers – Seafarer’s Upgrading Program (SUP) sources b. Scholarship for dependents – Education for Development Scholarship Program (EDSP), OFW Dependents Scholarship Program (OFWDSP) and Education and Livelihood Assistance Program (ELAP) c. Short-term training programmes for OFWs and dependents – Skills-for-Employment Scholarship Program (SESP) and information technology programme 4. Workers Welfare Assistance Program – On-Site Welfare Case Management and In-Country Welfare Case Management 5. Repatriation programme 6. Reintegration programme – Reintegration Preparedness (On-Site) and Reintegration (In-Country)

Name of the fund

Table 10.1 (Continued)

Sri Lanka (1985)

Nepal (2007)

4.

5.

Foreign Employment Welfare Fund13

Overseas Workers’ Welfare Fund (OWWF)11 under Sri Lanka Bureau of Foreign Employment (SLBEF)

1. Insurance coverage – repatriation, death at work, death within three months of return, permanent/ partial disablement at work 2. Arranging loan for migrant workers at low interest rate for housing, pre-departure, self-employment12 3. Scholarship programme for children of workers registered with SLBEF 4. Other welfare benefits – Sahana Housing Project for disabled migrant workers, Daru Diriya Programme, child protection programme/child day care centre, distribution of school equipment and welfare assistance for the needy migrant workers 1. Providing skill-oriented training to the workers going for foreign employment 2. Repatriating workers to Nepal due to mutilation or reason referred to in Sub-section (1) of Section 75, providing financial assistance to the workers 3. Launching employment-oriented programmes for the workers who have come back from foreign employment 4. Where a worker who has gone abroad for foreign employment dies there and his or her dead body is not attended to by anyone, bringing the dead body to Nepal and providing financial assistance to his or her family 5. Carrying out acts relating to foreign employment promotion 6. Provide education and access to health facilities to the children of migrant workers14 1. Migrant workers 2. Dependent families back home15

1. Migrant workers 2. Dependent families back home

1. Amounts deposited as prescribed by the workers prior to going for foreign employment and the interest earned from the deposits 2. Amount received by way of license fees and license renewal fees 3. Amounts received by the fund from the institutions related to the foreign employment 4. Grants and assistance received from any native or foreign persons or bodies

1. Registration with Sri Lanka Bureau of Foreign Employment (SLBFE)

138  T.L.S. Bhaskar

Pre departure 4 MRCs, 1 OWRC, media campaign and iniaves of strate governments, GRM, MADAD

On site Return and reintegraon MGPSY, GRM, MADAD and TMR

Labour officers, shelter homes, IWRC, open house by missions/posts, MADAD, and labour welfare camps, GRM, MADAD and TMR

Figure 10.1  Protective measures at all stages of migration cycle Source: Survey conducted by the author.

provides details on such funds from Bangladesh, the Philippines and Sri Lanka, including details on the services available, target beneficiaries and various sources of fund accumulation. It also provides details of services available under India’s ICWF, which is discussed in subsequent sections of the chapter.

About Indian Community Welfare Fund (ICWF) The ICWF, henceforth referred to as Fund, was set up in October 2009 in 17 ECR16 countries and Maldives ‘to meet contingency expenditure incurred by missions for various on-site welfare activities for Overseas Indian Citizens in distress’.17 The Fund enables Indian missions and posts to attend to various needs of Indian citizens overseas who are in distress. Over the years since its establishment, the Fund has been particularly beneficial to Indian missions/posts in countries that host lakhs of Indian labour migrants, such as the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), United Arab Emirates (UAE) and other countries in the GCC,18 notwithstanding

Protection of labour migrants at destination countries 139 the large number of labour migrants to cater to. The Fund was extended to 24 Indian missions in April 2010 and to all remaining 157 countries in 2011. The Fund is different in many aspects when compared to other kinds of workers’ welfare funds established within India for welfare of various occupational groups,19 especially in the informal economy that it is restricted to Indian workers who are working overseas. The Fund is generated by three ways, namely (a) service charge which is levied by Indian missions and posts on passport, visa and consular services amounting to Rs 100 (translating to US$1.6) per service/ worker, (b) donations by Indian associations at destination countries and by prominent business establishments, through their Corporate Social Responsibility funds, which form the second source, and finally (c) initial budget support by MOIA to Indian missions and posts to set up ICWF up to Rs 5 lakhs for three years or till ICWF self-sustains, to meet deficit vis-à-vis utilization. As per the circular issued on 17 September 2012 (refer note 16), the Fund can be utilized for select services ‘on a means tested basis in the most deserving cases’, as shown in Table 10.1. These include providing boarding and lodging for distressed Indian workers in the vulnerable categories, extending emergency medical care, providing air passage and legal assistance and airlifting the mortal remains to India, local burial/cremation. The revised guidelines issued in 2012 expanded the scope of utilization and additional services such as providing small fines and penalties and supporting Indian associations including that of students’ associations.

Utilization pattern Since its inception in 2009, the Fund has been used for various purposes, as shown in Table 10.2. Of the total accumulation so far, nearly 40 per cent of it was spent in Asian countries, with Iraq,20 the UAE, KSA, Oman, Qatar and Bahrain among the countries with large spending. As it can be seen, the Fund has been most spent in countries in the GCC which are home to record number of labour migrants from India. Equally so, Africa also recorded 41 per cent spending; however, this is largely due to successful evacuations carried out from Yemen21 (of 4,741 Indians but also 1,947 foreign nationals from 48 countries till 18 April) and Libya (3,200 persons). In this regard requisite ICWF was transferred from other Indian missions/posts for carrying out critical activities in evacuation. Overall, 81 per cent of the Fund was spent by Indian missions/posts in Asia and Africa, with the utilization in Africa largely due to evacuations. See also Table 10.3. With regard to specific services for which the Fund was utilized, it has been most utilized22 for providing air passage to stranded

Table 10.2  Prominent activities using the ICWF No.

Indian mission/post

Activity

1.

Kingdom of Saudi Arabia

2.

Sharjah (United Arab Emirates)

3.

Ajman (United Arab Emirates)

4. 5.

Umm Al Quwain (United Arab Emirates) Dubai (United Arab Emirates)

6.

Beirut (Lebanon)

7.

Malaysia

Welfare and assistance to migrant workers during the Nitaqat Construction of crematorium/ burial ground Construction of multipurpose centre and crematorium Construction of auditorium and social centre Shelter home for distressed Indian women pending repatriation 24/7 helpline for distressed Indian nationals Counselling centres and shelter homes for illegal Indian workers

Source: Ministry of Overseas Indian Affairs.

Table 10.3 Funds spent country-wise, out of the indian community welfare fund (ICWF) for carrying out welfare activities for overseas indian citizens SN Country

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18.

2013

2014

2015

2016 (Up to 15–07–2016)

(amount in Indian Rupees) Afghanistan 1,45,759 2,86,144 12,95,496 1,71,619 Bahrain 15,67,448 23,82,454 28,50,598 9,24,957 Indonesia 5,29,964 3,43,347 4,65,901 1,08,070 Iraq 6,85,958 30,97,21,165 3,27,26,567 3,65,582 Jordan 4,01,283 3,09,352 2,86,116 10,93,670 Kuwait 90,37,045 90,94,236 61,06,566 33,59,640 Lebanon 30,219 1,32,118 6,50,583 4,19,552 Libya 3,49,470 93,70,862 15,09,750 27,386 Malaysia 91,40,531 2,37,96,137 1,59,05,176 3,16,66,573 Oman 6,98,14,871 1,11,28,456 95,09,730 88,28,881 Qatar 33,50,623 38,86,447 85,85,479 51,05,151 Saudi Arabia 4,80,43,405 3,16,79,258 2,75,67,790 1,88,01,871 Sudan 1,10,925 Nil Nil Nil Syria Nil Nil 55,881 1,69,033 Thailand Nil Nil Nil Nil U. A. E. 9,58,29,176 33,98,12,771 20,44,38,364 3,09,02,327 Yemen 1,22,756 11,98,731 2,17,86,607 2,77,690 South Sudan Nil Nil Nil *Nil

*Figures related to the recent Operation Sankat Mochan for evacuation from South Sudan are not included.

Protection of labour migrants at destination countries 141

Pre departure stage Pre departure orientaon, skill tesng and cerficaon, country specific familiarizaon, financial inclusion for migrants and families, labour market informaon

Return and reintegraon Housing /business loans, scholarship programmes for children, health facilies and pension

On site Post arrival orientaon, re orientaon on local laws, skill upgradaon, low cost remiance channels, remiance saving products, social security

Figure 10.2  Existing measures at all stages of migration cycle Source: Survey conducted by the author.

Indians (41 per cent), followed by boarding and lodging for domestic workers and unskilled labourers (20 per cent), airlifting of mortal remains or local cremation/burial (12 per cent), support to Indian associations (5.3 per cent) and emergency medical care (5 per cent).

Recommendations It is quite evident that the ICWF has been playing a very critical role in the efforts of Indian missions/posts to ensure the safety and well-being of Indians citizens abroad, especially of those who migrate for work on a contractual basis to ECR countries and who are in some form of distress. However, a detailed examination of how such similar funds are operated out of other Colombo Process countries, as referred to in Table 10.1, openly suggests that such funds should aim at benefiting not only migrants but also their families back home. To finance the

142  T.L.S. Bhaskar expanded scope, measures such as mandatory contribution by workers to the Fund are worth examining. The following recommendations are worth examining in the medium and long term. Similar to a pool of protection measures available at all stages of migration (Figure 10.1), multiple activities, beyond those currently in operation (see India, Table 10.1), can be taken up using the ICWF aiming at holistic welfare of not only migrants but also their families. Figure 10.2 mentions various such welfare measures that can be introduced in the Indian context. Include families of migrant workers as beneficiaries Inclusion of families of migrant workers is important in the context of contemporary debate on migration and development. Most of the families of migrant workers often depend on social remittances sent. For sending governments, it is pertinent to focus on issues such as financial inclusion of families of migrants. Designing of financial-saving products which are driven by remittances to drive remittance-independent development among the families that receive remittances, scholarships to children of migrants, loans for returnee migrants for their reintegration into local economy and other facilities in geographies known for emigration on a large scale should be examined. In fact all major sending countries in the Colombo Process have programmes in place for families of migrants. Skill upgradation and certification It is often observed that lack of appropriate skills and certifications ends up workers in exploitation, especially in terms of payment of lower wages than that is promised in the contract. This often necessitates the foreign employers to invest additional time and money in retraining to address skill gaps. A step forward could be to devise a workable mechanism utilizing funds from ICWF, which mandates testing of skills as per the requirement at the destination. Moreover, potential migrants can be encouraged to avail loan-based scholarships from the Fund to enrol in skill upgradation programmes and get certified prior to departure. Such exercise also makes India a source of trained and certified manpower, and enhances India’s image abroad. Bilateral collaboration in terms of qualification frameworks between India and major destination countries is pivotal in such an attempt.

Protection of labour migrants at destination countries 143 Pre-departure orientation programme The Fund can be utilized for imparting pre-departure orientation among all those potential migrants who have taken a decision to find opportunities overseas and migrate for employment. After having obtained necessary documents, including contract, potential migrants can be encouraged to appear for mandatory pre-departure orientation programme for requisite awareness of life at the destination country. Since the government of India’s policy is to neither promote nor prevent migration, and make migration an informed choice, it only becomes imperative that measures leading to information dissemination at pre-departure stage are designed. There are various models of implementation in this regard, however, the key to design comprehensive manuals on pre-departure orientation and information dissemination, which are dovetailed to the Indian context. In the current context, the Fund can be utilized for imparting both generic and countryspecific pre-departure orientation programmes. To sustain such efforts, the programme can be embedded as a mandatory horizontal module in all accredited training centres under the National Skills Development Corporation (NSDC).23 Above all, collaboration between the central and state governments of prominent sending states in India is essential in imparting pre-departure orientation through state government agencies, local government agencies and relevant communitybased organizations. Such efforts are necessary in states such as Uttar Pradesh,24 Bihar and Rajasthan which are emerging as major source states for international migrants, and in traditional sending states such as Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Kerala and Tamil Nadu. Collaboration with destination countries Implementation of on-site welfare activities necessitates collaboration with governments at destination. While foreign employers are mandated to implement obligations under the contract, including health and safety, there are other measures that can jointly be taken up by both India and destination countries in terms of providing appropriate post-arrival orientation seminars, creating awareness on safety of women migrant workers at destination, technological innovation for protection rights of women and vulnerable categories of workers, social security provisions, skill upgradation programmes, re-certification, information dissemination on transparency in remittance transfer with regard to cost and channels available to migrant workers and reducing the cost of remittance transfer.25

144  T.L.S. Bhaskar

Acknowledgement The views expressed in this chapter are strictly of the author and do not necessarily represent the organization he works with, the India Centre for Migration (ICM). The author would like to acknowledge the support of the CEO, ICM, Ms. Vani Rao.

Notes 1 The United Nations has included migration, in Goal 10 on Reduced Inequalities, as one of the critical issues requiring attention of governments. 2 The recently concluded Third Senior Officials Meeting of Colombo Process, on 4–5 November 2015 reflected on the need for comprehensive welfare measures at all stages of migration cycle. 3 Currently, the four MRCs are located at Hyderabad, Cochin, Chennai and Gurgaon. 4 Both OWRC and IWRC are 24/7 helplines operating out of Delhi and Dubai, respectively, with the OWRC functional in 11 Indian languages. 5 MADAD is an initiative of the Ministry of External Affairs and is a Consular Grievances Monitoring System. For more details on the portal, refer to https://org2.passportindia.gov.in/AppConsularProject/welcomeLink. 6 Applicants can track the transportation of mortal remains at https://emigrate. gov.in/ext/PreMortalTrackStatus.action. 7 Details of actual utilization and beneficiaries are available at http://www. wewb.gov.bd/. 8 Welfare of migrants and their families is under Section 19 (2) (k) of Emigration Ordinance of 1982. 9 Countries such as the Philippines have had several schemes for welfare of overseas Filipino workers. The OWWA is as per the latest act. 10 For more details on history of previous funds for overseas Filipino workers, visit http://www.owwa.gov.ph/?q=content/owwa; the operational guidelines and rules are outlined in OWWA Omnibus Rules 2003. 11 The Sri Lanka Bureau of Foreign Employment Act No. 21 of 1985 created both the Sri Lanka Bureau of Foreign Employment (SLBFE) and the Overseas Workers’ Welfare Fund (OWWF). Refer to http://publications. iom.int/system/files/pdf/labour_migration_asia_2.pdf. 12 The loan arrangement is done in collaboration with four prominent banks that include Peoples Bank, Bank of Ceylon, National Saving Bank and State Mortgage & Investment Bank for all migrant workers registered with the Sri Lanka Bureau of Foreign Employment (SLBFE) and have a NonResidence Foreign Currency (NRFC) account with a minimum deposit of US$500. 13 The Fund is established under Section 32 of Foreign Employment Act, 2064 (2007), and is managed by the Foreign Employment Promotion Board. The act can be seen at http://www.dofe.gov.np/new/uploads/article/ foreign-employment-act_20120420110111.pdf. 14 Refer to the report on Labour Migration for Employment: A Status Report for Nepal: 2013–14 at https://asiafoundation.org/resources/pdfs/ MigrationReportbyGovernmentofNepal.pdf.

Protection of labour migrants at destination countries 145 15 For additional details on policy perspective of the fund in Nepal, refer to http://www.mole.gov.np/uploaded/materials/1395307595_8315_document_ file.pdf. 16 Indians holding Emigration Clearance Required (ECR) passports require emigration clearance (EC) prior to their departure for employment for 17 notified countries under Emigration Act of 1983. The government of India, under the provisions of the act, can exclude or include any country from obtaining emigration clearance. The ECR countries currently include the ones shown in Table 10.1. 17 Government of India. Circular F.No. OI-11012/14/2012-EP-1 on Revised Indian Community Welfare Fund (ICWF) Scheme in Indian missions abroad, New Delhi, 17 September 2012. 18 The ECR data with respect to GCC countries can be seen in Table 10.1. 19 The Bidi Workers Welfare Fund, the Construction Workers Welfare Fund and so on in India are generally built on cess or even a tax collected. The categories of benefit include pension, loans, provident funds and other medical and social benefits. 20 Prominently due to the evacuation of 6,056 people from Iraq. 21 The evacuation from Yemen actually happened from Djibouti (Republic of Djibouti). For more details on Operation Raahat, refer to http://mea. gov.in/Speeches-Statements.htm. The data is till 18 April 2015 and the operation continued beyond. 22 The percentages are based on data collected and analysed by the author in February–March 2015. 23 The NSDC, an initiative of Ministry of Finance, has been instrumental in establishing the Sector Skills Councils (SSCs), which in turn have started to write National Occupational Standards (NOS) for various occupations. NSDC also has been instrumental in accrediting training agencies to train and certify as per the NOS. However, it is only a matter of time for potential international migrant workers from India before which mutual agreements on qualification frameworks of COO and COD are arrived at and exclusive SSCs are established for international migrant workers. 24 Data in the last couple of years indicates Uttar Pradesh and Bihar as major source states for international migrant workers in the ECR category leaving to major destinations in GCC countries. 25 For a detailed list of issues that require collaboration between Colombo Process Member States and countries in Abu Dhabi Dialogue, and some of which can be taken up utilizing ICWF, refer to Outcome Document of Third Senior Officials Meeting of CP at http://www.colomboprocess.org/ news_more-30a-10.html.

11 A profile of secondgeneration Indian high school students in Kuwait Nasra M. Shah

Indian nationals comprise the largest group of non-nationals in Kuwait. At the end of 2012, 692,525 Indians were residing in the country on some sort of legal visa, constituting about 18 per cent of the total population (3,823,728) of the country.1 A majority (84.5 per cent) of the Indian residents were on a work visa, while 13.4 per cent were dependents of the working persons, mainly wives and children (Table 11.1). In terms of the duration for which Indian nationals have been residing in Kuwait, censuses and demographic surveys do not usually provide such information. Observation of the Indian community indicates, however, that several Indians have resided in Kuwait for many years, bearing children in the country and raising a secondgeneration here.2 The phenomenon of long-term migration has taken root even though like other GCC countries, Kuwait defines migration as a temporary phenomenon governed by strict rules and regulations to manage the mobility of workers. Only a minority of workers are allowed to bring in their families if they earn an income above a specified minimum. Those earning a minimum monthly salary of KD 250 (US$900 or more) in the public sector or KD 400 (US$1,400) in the private sector may bring their wives and childr en (MOI, 2013) (www.e.gov. kw/MOI). Working women are usually not allowed to sponsor the migration of their husband. Male children may live under the father’s sponsorship until age 21, while female children may do so until they are married. Male children may live in Kuwait after reaching age 21 only if they have a student visa, or are working and have a work visa. Migration rules do not entitle children born in Kuwait to foreign nationals to become its citizens, regardless of the duration for which they have lived in the country. Thus, a substantial proportion of Kuwait-born persons, including Indians, have been living in the country as foreigners even though this is the only country where they

Second-generation Indian students in Kuwait 147 Table 11.1 Number of Indian nationals in Kuwait according to visa status, 31 December 2012

Total Work visa Total Male Female Family member visa Total Male Female Student visa Total Male Female Other visa* Total Male Female

Number

Percentage

692,525

100.0

585,506 474,755 110,751

84.5 68.6 15.9

92,805 30,674 62,131

13.4 4.4 9.0

16 15 1

0.0 0.0 0.0

14,198 12,260 1,938

2.0 1.8 0.2

Source: GLMM, http://gulfmigration.eu/. Table Mov.2.3. *

Temporary visa for up to one year or self-sponsorship visa.

may have resided most of their lives. While the group of long-term and second-generation residents may carry important implications for Kuwait’s labour force, research on this group is almost non-existent. The main objective of this chapter is to outline a profile of the second-generation Indian high school students and their families. A related objective is to describe the aspirations and ambitions of these students for the future and assess the aspects they like and dislike about living in Kuwait.

Data This chapter is based on a survey of second-generation high school students, selected from two Indian schools in Kuwait. Indians were part of a larger study on second-generation non-nationals, Arab and Asian, conducted during April–December 2012 in Kuwait (for details, see Shah, 2013a). In order to cater to a large population of Indian students, several private schools have been established in Kuwait. Indian or other non-national students are not eligible to enter Kuwaiti public schools that are essentially reserved for Kuwaiti nationals, with some

148  Nasra M. Shah exceptions. At the time of our study, conducted in April–May 2012, there were 18 Indian schools in Kuwait. From these schools, two were chosen, namely Carmel High School in Kheitan and Indian Community School in Salmiya. The selection of these two schools was guided by two principles: to cover different geographical areas where Indian residents predominate and to include schools with the maximum amount of student variability to maximize representativeness. All students in 11th and 12th grades in the two schools who fulfilled our inclusion criteria were requested to fill out a structured questionnaire in their class room. After giving the necessary instructions, the data collection team waited outside the classroom. The teacher for the class room was usually in the class while students filled out the questionnaire. We defined second-generation non-nationals to include those students who were born in Kuwait and had lived at least half their life in the country. A sample of 285 Indian students was selected from the two schools. Permission for the study was granted by the Joint Committee for the Protection of Human Subjects in Research of the Health Sciences Center and Kuwait Institute for Medical Specialization. Prior to approaching the principals of the selected schools for data collection in the respective schools, permission was obtained from the Private Schools Administration in the Ministry of Education.

Results Of the 285 Indian students, almost 57 per cent were female (Table 11.2). The average age of the male and female students was 16.2 years and 16.1 years, respectively. The number of siblings was on average less than one, implying that most of the students were from small families containing either one or two children. More than two-thirds of the students were living in Hawally, surrounding the Indian Community School. The average number of persons per household, and per bedroom was 4.4, and 2.4, respectively. About one-fifth of the students had a relative other than parents and siblings living with them, while almost 90 per cent had relatives living in Kuwait though not in the same house. The average number of relatives living in Kuwait (but not in the same house) was reported as 12.4 by male students and 15.3 by female students. Almost 96 per cent of the students lived with both parents, and a majority did not know the income of the family. Regarding the main socio-demographic characteristics of their father, presented in Table 11.3, about 5 per cent students reported that their father was born in Kuwait, thus rendering our respondents

Age   18 years Age descriptive   Mean (SD)   Median (IQR) Grade  11th  12th Mean number of siblings  Brothers  Sisters Area of residence (governorates)  Capital  Hawally  Farwaniya  Jahra   Mubarak Al Kabir  Ahmadi Mean number of persons in house (SD)   Median (IQR) 6.8 75.2 15.4 0.0 0.0 2.6 1.4 2.0

8 88 18 0 0 3 4.3 4.0

55.3 44.7

68 55 0.8 0.7

0.7 1.0

16.2 16.0

0.7 0.6

15.7 52.1 30.6 1.7

19 63 37 2

20 101 35 0 0 4 4.5 4.0

0.7 0.8

70 92

16.1 16.0

32 83 45 2

n

n

12.5 63.1 21.9 0.0 0.0 2.5 1.3 1.0

0.7 0.8

43.2 56.8

0.7 1.0

19.8 51.2 27.8 1.2

Percentage

n = 162 (56.8)

n = 123 (43.2) Percentage

Female

Male

Table 11.2  Characteristics of second-generation high school Indian students by gender

28 189 53 0 0 7 4.4 4.0

0.7 0.7

138 147

16.1 16.0

51 146 82 4

n

n = 285

Total

(Continued)

10.1 68.2 19.1 0.0 0.0 2.5 1.3 1.0

0.7 0.8

48.4 51.6

0.7 1.0

18.0 51.6 29.0 1.4

Percentage

Source: Shah (2013a).

Mean number of persons per bedroom (SD)   Median (IQR) Have relatives other than mother, father siblings living in same house  Yes  No Have relatives in Kuwait not in the same house  Yes  No Mean number of relatives in Kuwait not in the same house   Mean (SD)   Median (IQR) Currently living with   Both parents  Mother  Father   Other relatives Total monthly income (KD)   chi2 –2*log ll Residual Akaike Degrees of information Freedom criterion (AIC)

Original model logfamsize immigrant age sex jobseeker educationl~l marital_st~s employ~d logfamiY

1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1

0.2270 0.0326 0.4769 0.4858 0.7752 0.8522 0.0497 0.0116 0.0391

1.46 4.57** 0.51 0.49 0.08 0.03 3.85** 6.37** 4.26**

344.90 346.36 349.47 345.40 345.38 344.98 344.93 348.75 351.27 349.16

285 284 284 284 284 284 284 284 284 284

364.90 364.36 367.47 363.40 363.38 362.98 362.93 366.75 369.27 367.16

Source: Author’s estimates. Note: Significance level: *** p < 0.001, ** p < 0.05, * p < 0.10.

χ2(1) = 4.57, p < 0.05 marital status, χ2(1) = 3.85, p < 0.05 employed, χ2(1) = 6.37, p < 0.05 and the log of family incomes, χ2(1) = 4.26, p < 0.05. The LR tests show that the increase in family size with respect to higher age among males literate has no significant influence on the land ownership. The significant predictors are expected to have some association on the regressed. Furthermore, the most important test for confirming the logistic model for landownership is to estimate the goodness-of-fit test. We have adopted the standard post-estimation test of Hosmer-Lemeshow chi2. The model fit with N = 295; the number split into 31 groups; Hosmer-Lemeshow chi2 (29) =47.36, with Prob > chi2 = 0.0171. Hosmer-Lemeshow chi2 test shows with 29 degrees of freedom, it is statistically significant χ2(29) = 47.36, p < 0.05. This confirmed the overall model goodnessof-fit that the non-native settler has more likelihood of landownership. Probing the probability on the intensity of conflict MODEL 2

Yi = β0 + β1hhsizei + β 2 non-native i + β 3agei + β 4 sexi + β 5 jobseekeri + β6logpcyi + β7 pcnetlandi + β8inmigrti + β 9languagei + β10recentimmigranti + β11lawenformnt i + β12 povertyi + β13 pcinvsmnti + ε i

Cross-border migration and conflicts in Assam 277 where Incident(Yi) = 1 if the household has faced the risk of violent incident; 0 if not β1hhsizei = the size of the family members β2non-nativei = 1 if non-native settlers; 0 otherwise β3agei = current age of the household head β4sexi = gender of the household head: 1 if male; 0 otherwise β5jobseekeri = 1 if unemployed search for job; 0 otherwise β6logpcyi = log of per capita income of the households β7pcnetlandi = per capita land availability of the households β8inmigrti = 1 if internal in-migrants; 0 otherwise β9languagei = 1 if language spoken is Bengali; 0 otherwise β10recentimmigranti = 1 if immigrants arrive recently (irregular); 0 otherwise β11lawenformnti = 1 if efficient law and order situation; 0 otherwise β12povertyi = 1 if holding BPL card; 0 otherwise β13pcinvsmnti = 1 if households engaged in any kind of investment; 0 otherwise εi = error terms As shown in Table 18.7, for every incident of conflict event the odds ratio for non-native is significant at p < 0.1. Those persons who are unemployed and continuing searching for the job shows highly significant at p < 0.001. Forsberg’s (2011) study found that if the nativity of the migrants is not the son of the soil and is immigrants’ nativity more likely to increase the incidence of violence conflicts. If the family is poor, there is high chance that at least one may join in any conflict group for indulging in violence (significant at p < 0.1). The economic factor inequality in the land–man ratio shows to be a cause to violent conflict and is significant at p < 0.001. The incidents of violent conflict will have great impact on the per capita investment of the households (significant at p < 0.001). Conflict event not only is caused by the economic factors, but it also clearly shows that causes are the noneconomic factors, such as identity/ethnicity based on language spoken identified as Bengali migrants and the recent arrival of immigrants from Bangladesh which is significant at p < 0.1. Age, sex, household size, social group, family income and inefficient law and order situation do not show any significant influence on the incident of conflict event. Table 18.8 shows the post-estimation of likelihood ratio test between the predictor variables and the regress and of occurrence of at least one incident event and face off by the people. The post-estimation

Table 18.7 Logistic estimates of the likelihood of the incident of conflict event Variable

Odds ratio

hhsize 1.197 non-native 0.402 age 1.010 sex 1.624 jobseeker 0.172 logpcy 1.211 pcnetland 1.551 inmigrt 2.626 language 0.384 recentimmigrant 0.508 lawenformnt 0.564 poverty 0.466 pcinvsmnt 0.665 Number of observations = 295 LR chi2(14) = 121.09 Log likelihood = –143.8504 Prob > chi2 = 0.0000 Pseudo R2 = 0.2962

Standard error

p value

0.149 0.162 0.017 0.889 0.066 0.563 0.173 1.667 0.214 0.183 0.235 0.190 0.075

0.147 0.024* 0.560 0.376 0.000*** 0.681 0.000*** 0.128 0.086* 0.060* 0.170 0.061* 0.000***

Source: Author’s estimates. Note: Significance level: *** p < 0.001, * p < 0.10.

Table 18.8  Likelihood ratio test Original model

df

chi2

p > chi2

–2*log ll

Res. df

AIC

Variable hhsize non-native age sex jobseek logpcy pcnetland inmigrnt language recentimmigrant lawenformnt poverty pcinvsmnt

1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1

2.17 5.12** 0.34 0.78 22.66*** 0.17 17.46*** 2.39 2.96* 3.56* 1.91 3.61* 14.16***

0.141 0.024 0.560 0.378 0.000 0.682 0.000 0.122 0.085 0.059 0.167 0.058 0.000

287.70 289.87 292.82 288.04 288.48 310.37 287.87 305.16 290.09 290.66 291.26 289.61 291.31 301.86

280 279 279 279 279 279 279 279 279 279 279 279 279 279

317.70 317.87 320.82 316.04 316.48 338.37 315.87 333.16 318.09 318.66 319.26 317.61 319.31 329.86

Source: Author’s estimates. Note: Significance level: *** p < 0.001, ** p < 0.05, * p < 0.10.

Cross-border migration and conflicts in Assam 279 results with the degrees of freedom at one showed the level of significance of the likelihood ratio chi2 test for individual variable is the same for all variables that are significant in the previous explanation of the odd ratio test. Except for the non-native settlers, the probability of increasing the violent incident is more likely to occur, χ2(1) = 5.12, p < 0.05. Further validation of the overall model of goodness-of-fit for the possible occurrence of incidence of violent event is to estimates store applied for estimation. The post-estimation test of Hosmer-Lemeshow chi2 model fit with N = 295; the number split into 51 groups; HosmerLemeshow chi2 (49) = 66.58, with Prob >chi2 = 0.048. HosmerLemeshow chi2 test shows with 49 degrees of freedom, it is statistically significant χ2(49) = 66.58, p < 0.05. This result reveals that we have chosen the strong predictors that have overall goodness-of-fit on the dependent variable.

Conclusion The cause of conflict is more of economic in nature, as some nonnative groups prove to be more skilled than the natives. It is found that there is high degree of inequality in land resources between the native and the non-native households. The non-native settlers have more likelihood of landownership. The land distributions in terms of holding size is equally distributed among the non-native households than the natives. The intensity of conflict event, explained in many development theories of conflict, is occurring due to not only economic factors but also other social factors that contribute to the incidence of violent events. It is usually the case when the non-native reaches the assigned boundary of land rights of the natives that conflict results. This empirical finding is consistent with the findings of (Forsberg, 2011).

Acknowledgements This chapter was a part of the PhD thesis, ‘Cross-Border Migration, Resource Conflicts and Development – The Case of Assam State, India: An Empirical Investigation’, submitted to Jawaharlal Nehru University, Delhi, in 2014 under the supervisions of Professors S. Irudaya Rajan and K. Narayanan Nair, Centre for Development Studies. I am thankful to both of them for their insightful comments and support at the various stages of this study. The views expressed in this chapter are those of the author.

280  Rikil Chyrmang

Notes 1 A model for binary response where the response probability is the logit function evaluated at a linear function of the explanatory variables. 2 The sum of the log-likelihoods, where the log-likelihood for each observation is the log of the density of the dependent variable given the explanatory variables; the log-likelihood function is viewed as a function of the parameters to be estimated. 3 A degree of freedom (df) in regression analysis is the number of observations minus the number of estimated parameters. 3

2 2 2  1  2 4 χ = v 1 − +X X + (2v − 1) , according to the  or χ = 9 v 9 v 2   degree of accuracy required. X is the standardised normal deviate corresponding to P = 1 – Q (Ramanathan, 2002). Chi-squared distribution is a probability distribution obtained by adding the squares of independent standard normal random variables. The number of terms in the sum equals the degrees of freedom in the distribution. 5 It is referring to a broadly applicable estimation method where the parameter estimates are chosen to maximise the log-likelihood function. 2

{

}

References Acock, A.C. 2010. A Gentle Introduction to Stata. College Station, TX: A Stata Press Publication. Dutta, A.P. 2012. ‘Land of Discord, Down to Earth’. http://www.downtoearth. org.in/content/land-discord/. Accessed 10 December 2014. Everitt, B.S. and A. Skrondal. 2010. The Cambridge Dictionary of Statistics. New York: Cambridge University Press. Forsberg, E. 2011. ‘ “Sons-of-the-Soil” and Local Insurgencies: Assessing the Impact of Migration on Civil Conflicts in Northeast India Using the UCDP Geo-referenced Event Dataset (GED)’, Paper prepared for presentation at the Research Paper Seminar, Department of Peace and Conflict Research, 17 February. Karna, M.N. 2004. Agrarian Structures and Land Reforms in Assam. New Delhi: Regency Publishers. Maddala, G.S. 1992. Introduction to Econometrics. New York: Macmillan Publishing Company. Pampel, C. 2000. Logistic Regression: A Primer, Series: Quantitative Applications in the Social Sciences. London, UK: Sage, p. 132. Ramanathan, R. 2002. Introduction to Econometrics with Application. South Western USA: Thomson.

19 Appraisal of MGNREGP on distress migration in Andhra Pradesh Vijay Korra

The government of India passed the ‘National Rural Employment Guarantee Act, 2005’ (NREGA, 2005) on 2 February 2006. The act guarantees 100 days of employment in a financial year to any rural household whose adult members are willing to do unskilled manual work. It primarily targets to provide employment to the rural poor, particularly to schedule castes (SCs), schedule tribes (STs), landless labourers and marginal farmers. The other endeavours of the scheme are to improve land productivity, farm output, rural infrastructure and guaranteed employment, therefore enhancing overall income and living standards of rural poor. However, the scheme from its inception till date has undergone multiple changes. The scheme became operational in all the rural districts of India from the financial year 2008–9. Subsequently, the act was renamed as ‘Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act, 2005’ (MGNREGA, 2005). The current wage rate is Rs 125 per day although this differs across states based on their population, and equal wages apply both male and female workers. The government of India bears almost all of the total cost of wages and 75 per cent of the material cost, and 25 per cent is borne by state government(s). The central and state governments’ share of financing is in the ratio of 90:10 (MGNREGA, 2005). MGNREGA provides rural labour with a right to employment enforceable through a court of law – something that cannot be taken away with a change of government. Employment is provided on demand basis, and there is time-bound action to fulfil the guarantee. It provides unemployment allowance in case employment is not provided in a stipulated time period. The funds under the act cannot be used for any other purposes. There is accountability in the public delivery system. Nevertheless, the ground reality presents a diverse and mixed picture of it where the scheme is surrounded by multiple challenges like non-homogeneity in its outcomes, effectiveness, region-specific

282  Vijay Korra disparities and allegations of corruption (Dreze and Oldiges, 2009). A study in the context of Chittoor district of Andhra Pradesh made known that the nomadic tribals predominantly depended on migration for survival. But now with the MGNREGA in place, they have stopped migrating to cities like Bangalore and Chennai, as they have a source of livelihood during droughts and off-fishing seasons (Hirway, 2010). Correspondingly, a recent study in Madhya Pradesh revealed that there are as high as 85 days per household per year, and nearly half of all working households have got 100 days of work. They also earned a minimum statutory wage (Khera, 2008). A study in the context of Mahabubnagar district disclosed that in 2005 more than 3 lakh workers had migrated to Mumbai, Surat, Pune and other places in search of jobs. The astonishing figures came down to around 35,000 in the 2007–8 financial year in the district (Panchayati Raj Update, 2008). Also, some social activists through their field experience observed that workers earned close to the statutory minimum wage of Rs 70 per day and that wages were paid within 15 days or so (Pankaj, 2008). In a different context, Dreze opined that this is an unprecedented opportunity for the rural poor, and there was evident appreciation of it among casual labourers and other disadvantaged sections of the population. He hoped that MGNREGA would enable poor to avoid long-distance distress migration with all its hardships (Dreze and Oldiges, 2008). Khera (2008) corroborate that the scheme has delivered significant benefits for the women and increased food security and working conditions. Moreover, MGNREGA has been playing a vital role and makes a mark in lives of many rural poor (Panchayati Raj Updates, 2008). A study in connection with enhancing accountability in public service delivery through social audits in Andhra Pradesh State exposed that social audit is indeed an important tool in building social awareness about the programme and has been one of the very important factors in the successful implementation of the programme (Sridhar et al., 2010). The main issues that caught up in the scheme are delay in issuing job cards, employment and wage payments, manipulation in attendance, inadequate number of work days, rampant corruption, lack of transparency, administrative failure and lack of social audits (Mehrotra, 2008; Pankaj, 2008). All this resulted in mixed outcomes about the efficacy of the scheme in terms of both asset generation and economic benefits to the beneficiaries. It is in this backdrop that this chapter aims at evaluating employment and wage patterns as well as some of the key outcomes of MGNREGA scheme in the context of Andhra Pradesh (erstwhile state). This

Distress migration in Andhra Pradesh 283 is done chiefly because Andhra Pradesh is regarded as the most successful and model state in the country in implementing the programme (Dreze and Oldiges, 2009). This motivates to evaluate the scheme in the state. In so doing, the chapter employed available aggregate data on MGNREGA(S) which was collected from its state website for the period of 2009–10 financial year. The analysis is carried out at interdistrict level, caste and gender-wise. The chapter is divided into four sections. The first section discusses the muster rolls of and employment patterns of MGNREGA labourers across the districts in Andhra Pradesh. The second section deals with the gender-wise employment patterns. The third section discusses employment status and work done by labourers under different categories. The final section provides the conclusions.

Employment patterns of MGNREGA workers As regards job cards, the study reveals that distribution of households with job cards across districts seems to be in keeping with their development status. On the whole, a substantial portion of job cards are issued in East Godavari, Anantapur, Nalgonda, Mahabubnagar, Kurnool and Warangal districts. Conversely, Ranga Reddy, Nizamabad, Visakhapatnam, Krishna and Medak districts have only a marginal share of job card–holding households. Such differences could be due to uneven level of development between the districts. For instance, districts with a large number of job cards issued are mostly less developed districts, and districts with less number of job cards are relatively developed districts in the state. Further, the predominant beneficiaries belong to the OBCs, followed by the SCs, other/upper caste and ST categories, respectively. It is worthwhile to mention that SCs issued job cards are predominantly in West Godavari, Kurnool and Nellore; STs are largely issued in Khammam, Visakhapatnam and Adilabad; and OBCs with greater number of job cards are mostly placed in Srikakulam, Vizianagaram and Mahabubnagar districts, while upper castes issued job cards are predominantly located in Kadapa, Chittoor and Guntur districts. Note that these districts indeed account for the large population, which is reflected in MGNREGA job card–holding households (Table 19.1). However, it is only about 50 per cent of households who were actively working in the MGNREGA scheme in Andhra Pradesh. It implies that job card–issued households are yet to get full employment. The households that are actively working under the scheme are predominantly in Nalgonda, Warangal, Karimnagar and Mahabubnagar,

284  Vijay Korra Table 19.1  Distribution of job card-issued households across the districts according to social groups during the 2009–10 financial year District

Number of households issued job cards

Adilabad 441,405 Anantapur 768,557 Chittoor 608,175 East Godavari 772,900 Guntur 502,026 Kadapa 497,829 Karimnagar 564,655 Khammam 538,008 Krishna 431,077 Kurnool 653,627 Mahabubnagar 675,787 Medak 442,348 Nalgonda 743,992 Nizamabad 392,707 Prakasam 492,762 Ranga Reddy 261,640 454,036 S.P.S. Nellore Srikakulam 482,173 Visakhapatnam 428,534 Vizianagaram 486,117 Warangal 621,423 West Godavari 480,260 Andhra 1,174,038 Pradesh

Percentage of SC households issued job cards

Percentage of ST house­ holds issued job cards

Percentage of BC households issued job cards

Percentage of others households issued job cards

24 18 27 27 34 26 29 21 41 25 23 27 23 23 32 29 35 11 7 12 23 37 25

29 5 6 9 7 4 5 37 5 2 9 7 14 11 5 10 13 8 37 13 19 6 11

41 51 36 39 29 31 58 32 39 56 59 55 53 56 33 46 33 76 35 71 52 40 47

6 26 31 26 30 40 8 10 15 17 9 10 10 11 30 15 18 5 21 4 6 17 17

Sources: www.nrega.ap.gov.in and www.rd.ap.gov.in (MGNREGA websites of Andhra Pradesh Government). Note: The data is taken for the 2009–10 financial year (up to March). The data is compiled by the author.

and less actively working households are mostly placed in the Guntur, Ranga Reddy, Krishna and West Godavari districts. It is worthwhile to point out the discrepancy in working household patterns between regions where majority of the working households happen to be in the Telangana region, which still has to experience large-scale development. In contrast, there were a lower proportion of working households in the Andhra region, which is considered one of the prosperous and developed regions of the state (Table 19.2).

Distress migration in Andhra Pradesh 285 Table 19.2 Distribution of working households across the districts by their castes during the 2009–10 financial year District

Number of total working households

258,002 Adilabad Anantapur 333,691 Chittoor 246,199 East Godavari 319,704 Guntur 94,542 Kadapa 226,058 Karimnagar 368,528 Khammam 303,981 Krishna 151,956 Kurnool 276,866 Mahabubnagar 362,297 Medak 254,645 Nalgonda 402,394 Nizamabad 215,450 Prakasam 291,096 Ranga Reddy 121,702 S.P.S. Nellore 185,296 Srikakulam 287,360 Visakhapatnam 287,255 Vizianagaram 294,183 Warangal 386,660 West Godavari 185,991 Andhra 5,853,856 Pradesh

Percentage of SC working households

Percentage of ST working households

Percentage of BC working households

Percentage of others working households

26 21 33 31 36 29 30 21 45 28 25 30 24 25 32 31 39 11 7 12 23 42 26

32 5 6 15 9 3 5 40 4 2 8 7 14 11 3 10 8 10 39 13 17 8 13

39 54 35 36 31 33 59 31 38 59 62 57 55 57 34 48 34 75 34 72 55 37 49

3 20 26 18 24 35 6 8 12 11 5 6 7 8 30 11 19 4 20 3 5 12 13

Sources: www.nrega.ap.gov.in and www.rd.ap.gov.in (MGNREGA websites of Andhra Pradesh Government). Note: The data is taken for the 2009–10 financial year (up to March). The data is compiled by the author.

With reference to the caste composition of MGNREGA working households, the study reveals that SC households mostly work in Krishna, West Godavari and Nellore districts; STs predominantly work in Khammam, Visakhapatnam and Adilabad; and OBCs work in Srikakulam, Vizianagaram and Mahabubnagar. The upper-caste households work mostly in Kadapa, Prakasam and Chittoor districts. The region- and caste-specific outcome sug1gests that poor households from backward districts of Telangana and Rayalaseema considerably participated in the MGNREGA scheme. In contrast, households from prosperous districts of Andhra region are engaged in a small scale, while their backward

286  Vijay Korra counterparts are engaged in large scale. This could be on account of household composition and region-specific socio-economic factors. On the other hand, information on registered households and working households on the whole exposed that among registered households, only 50 per cent engaged in the scheme in the state. It is to be noted that registered households and job card–issued households are two different categories. Further, it is revealed that large proportions of beneficiaries of the scheme are STs, OBCs, SCs and upper castes in the category of working households out of the total registered households. The most benefited districts in terms of the utilisation of job cards are Visakhapatnam, Karimnagar, Warangal, Srikakulam, Vizianagaram and Prakasam, and the disadvantaged districts are Guntur, Krishna, West Godavari, Chittoor and Nellore. This implies that economically deprived communities and backward districts were more proactive in utilising their job cards while most developed districts are lagging behind in making use of their job cards. What is interesting here is that in some of the tribal-dominated districts, the SC registered households greatly working out of its total registered households. In contrast, a large proportion of tribal registered households are working in the SC-predominant districts, and there are more upper castes working in the OBC-dominated districts (Table 19.3). Furthermore, apart from providing employment to the rural poor and marginal farmers, the scheme accommodates disabled and self-help groups (SHG) in its purview. In this context, the information on registered and working SHG and disabled members shows that SHG members are in a more advantageous position compared to disabled members. Here, on the whole, the study exposed around 12 lakh total registered SHG members, out of which 47 per cent were working actively, while it was 1.6 lakh disabled members who registered, out of which 39 per cent were actively engaged in the MGNREGA programme in the state. It should be noted that the proportion of general MGNREGA workers is greater than SHG members and disabled workers in the scheme. Here, work participation of such members would in fact depend on the economic status of the SHG and disability level of a disabled member. When we look into the details, it is seen that the SHG members predominantly registered in the Chittoor, Anantapur, Khammam and Nalgonda districts are however mostly working in the Adilabad, Medak, Karimnagar and Warangal districts (Table 19.4). What is interesting in this is that though SHG-registered members are from all across the regions, when it comes to the effective utilisation of job cards (working members), most of these members happen to be from the Telangana region. This implicitly suggests that the backward regions can benefit more from government-initiated employment programmes like MGNREGA.

Distress migration in Andhra Pradesh 287 Table 19.3 Distribution of working households among registered households across the districts according to social groups during the 2009–10 financial year Districts

Percentage of working households among total registered households

Percentage of SC working households out of total registered

Percentage of ST working households out of total registered

Percentage of BC working households out of total registered

Percentage of others working households out of total registered

Adilabad Anantapur Chittoor East Godavari Guntur Kadapa Karimnagar Khammam Krishna Kurnool Mahabubnagar Medak Nalgonda Nizamabad Prakasam Ranga Reddy S.P.S. Nellore Srikakulam Visakhapatnam Vizianagaram Warangal West Godavari Andhra Pradesh

58 43 40 42 18 45 65 56 35 42 53 58 54 55 59 46 41 60 67 60 62 39 50

63 50 49 47 20 51 66 58 39 47 57 62 56 59 59 48 44 62 62 61 63 44 51

63 49 38 72 22 42 71 61 31 42 43 55 54 55 39 50 25 73 71 62 53 58 56

56 46 40 38 20 48 66 54 35 44 57 60 56 56 62 48 43 59 65 61 66 36 52

32 33 34 30 15 40 53 42 29 29 31 34 39 40 59 35 42 50 66 39 53 27 37

Sources: www.nrega.ap.gov.in and www.rd.ap.gov.in (MGNREGA websites of Andhra Pradesh Government). Note: The data is taken for the 2009–10 financial year (up to March). The data is compiled by the author.

Similarly, there are more disabled members registered in Nalgonda, Anantapur, Chittoor and so on, and a large proportion of them are working in Karimnagar, Adilabad, Visakhapatnam and Prakasam. Employment status of households by castes The success rate of the MGNERGA programme depends on two important factors: one is effective administration and the other is the

288  Vijay Korra Table 19.4 Distribution of registered and working SHG and disabled households across the districts during the 2009–10 financial year District

Number of registered SHG members

Percentage of SHG members working

Number of registered disabled members

Percentage of disabled members working

Adilabad Anantapur Chittoor East Godavari Guntur Kadapa Karimnagar Khammam Krishna Kurnool Mahabubnagar Medak Nalgonda Nizamabad Prakasam Ranga Reddy S.P.S. Nellore Srikakulam Visakhapatnam Vizianagaram Warangal West Godavari Andhra Pradesh

18,378 103,671 171,449 51,753 53,447 19,753 31,663 89,876 70,305 31,203 46,776 3,097 79,588 41,561 26,859 18,113 56,795 74,288 71,858 30,609 30,984 73,064 1,195,090

71 46 39 39 8 51 68 59 23 49 61 69 57 60 58 47 34 60 60 55 68 30 47

5,704 13,336 13,031 10,827 4,564 4,757 8,173 10,442 8,850 7,182 7,332 4,641 16,112 6,163 4,137 3,141 4,451 5,406 6,542 6,056 9,700 5,745 166,292

54 37 26 27 8 33 61 40 21 39 46 48 39 41 51 44 32 43 54 49 48 25 39

Sources: www.nrega.ap.gov.in and www.rd.ap.gov.in (MGNREGA websites of Andhra Pradesh Government). Note: The data is taken for the 2009–10 financial year (up to March). The data is compiled by the author.

beneficiary’s number of worked days. In this, OBCs, SCs, STs and upper castes predominantly worked in this programme in the proportion of 49, 25, 15 and 12 per cent, respectively. The most number of worked days were predominantly in Vizianagaram, Kurnool, Anantapur, Karimnagar and Nalgonda districts, while a lower number of worked days were in the Guntur, Krishna, Ranga Reddy and Nellore districts, respectively. This indicates that workers from backward districts predominantly utilised their job cards and vice versa. This could be because of better and diverse employment opportunities in developed districts and unemployment and lack of alternative opportunities in the backward districts (Table 19.5).

16,136,314 20,213,745 18,231,409 15,772,431 1,789,279 16,534,725 19,491,047 17,789,107 3,500,043 21,049,036 19,662,949 14,105,913 19,428,052 14,057,207 15,730,964 8,128,570 9,229,988 18,481,107 16,864,521 21,749,314 17,205,212 6,251,125 331,402,051

Adilabad Anantapur Chittoor East Godavari Guntur Kadapa Karimnagar Khammam Krishna Kurnool Mahabubnagar Medak Nalgonda Nizamabad Prakasam Ranga Reddy S.P.S. Nellore Srikakulam Visakhapatnam Vizianagaram Warangal West Godavari Andhra Pradesh

27 22 34 24 33 31 31 19 47 27 25 32 24 25 31 32 38 12 7 13 23 45 25

Percentage of SC households worked days 35 6 5 30 14 3 7 50 5 2 8 7 15 14 3 13 7 13 34 11 19 16 15

Percentage of ST  households worked days 36 54 37 32 32 33 57 26 38 61 62 56 55 55 36 46 34 70 39 73 54 30 49

Percentage of OBC households worked days 3 18 24 14 21 33 6 5 10 9 5 5 6 6 30 10 21 5 21 3 4 9 12

Percentage of others households worked days

Note: The data is taken for the 2009–10 financial year (up to March). The data is compiled by the author.

Sources: www.nrega.ap.gov.in and www.rd.ap.gov.in (MGNREGA websites of Andhra Pradesh Government).

Households total worked days

District

94 97 88 84 96 84 92 84 84 88 92 96 87 95 86 103 86 88 92 84 86 80 89

Household average wages

Table 19.5 Distribution of household worked days according to social groups across the districts during 2009–10 financial year

290  Vijay Korra Further, household worked days with reference to caste reveal that the proportion of SC households worked days were predominantly in West Godavari, Kurnool and Nellore, STs were largely in Khammam, Visakhapatnam and Adilabad and OBC households with majority of worked days were predominately in Srikakulam, Vizianagaram and Mahabubnagar districts while forward castes are predominantly documented in Kadapa, Chittoor and Guntur districts. The possible explanation for this could be the active role of local political leaders and effective administration. For instance, Vizianagaram, Srikakulam Table 19.6 Classification of households according to number of completed work days across the districts during the 2009–10 financial year Districts

Number of Percentage Percentage working of house­ of house­ households holds holds completed completed 100 days 75–100 days

Adilabad 255,043 Anantapur 332,292 Chittoor 245,130 East Godavari 317,898 Guntur 93,737 Kadapa 225,700 Karimnagar 366,749 Khammam 303,337 Krishna 151,220 Kurnool 274,993 Mahabubnagar 361,149 Medak 253,350 Nalgonda 399,985 Nizamabad 214,806 Prakasam 290,967 Ranga Reddy 121,307 S.P.S. Nellore 184,805 Srikakulam 285,641 Visakhapatnam 284,215 Vizianagaram 292,865 Warangal 384,304 West Godavari 182,423 Andhra 5,821,916 Pradesh

19 19 27 16 2 27 15 19 3 26 15 16 12 21 16 22 14 20 20 26 10 8 17

10 10 10 7 2 11 9 9 3 11 9 10 8 10 9 12 7 11 9 14 8 5 9

Percentage of house­ holds completed 50–75 days

Percentage of house­ holds completed