“I have left my previous job; I have left the house I was working in. I am calling from a different place now”, she said.
Mustafa
thought she sounded troubled. “Why on earth would you leave your job?”, he
asked surprised.
“I
shall tell you everything the next time. . . “, the line went dead.
A worried
husband having no means to contact his wife approached Human Rights Protection
Foundation.
Jameela had gone to Kuwait in search of a job as a house
maid. She had written letters of her well being to her husband Mustafa in
Kallikote, and had also assured that she would send money as soon as her
employer paid her. She had even talked to him over phone a couple of
times. She was gone for only four months when she went mysteriously
missing.
Where was Jameela? What had happened to her? What had forced
her to leave her job and move out? Did they find her? If so how? She spoke only malayalam. How did she manage
on a foreign land?
Jameela in jeopardy
“Is this the Human Rights office? Our
farm worker Mustafa’s wife is missing. The whole family is in panic. Would you please help? ”, asked the caller,
who said he was from Madikeri. It was
Sunday, the October 5th 2003.
“You better lodge a complaint with the
police immediately”, Dr Ravindranath Shanbhag, the President of Human Rights Protection Foundation, urged him.
“Sir, she is missing in Kuwait, not
here. So the police are helpless. The
family does not even have the knowledge about where Kuwait is. Would you be able to help?”
So
Dr Shanbhag asked him to send them to Udupi and also to tell them to carry any
relevant documents. The very next day
Mustafa arrived to narrate his woeful tale.
The activists of the foundation immediately set to work using the
documents he had brought with him.
*****
Mustafa,
a young man from a village called Aranpara in Kerala got married to Ahmad
Kutti’s daughter, Jameela. Though
uneducated, Mustafa was a very hard working man and knew farming very
well. In need for a better means of earning,
the family moved to Madikeri. Mustafa was
appointed as a gardener in a coffee plantation in the village Cherambana. The family somehow managed their livelihood
with their meager earnings, but eventually when they had 4 children, they found
it hard to manage without enough money for their education.
They
began looking for some better means of earning, hoping to give their children a
better future. It was then that they got
to know from some relatives in Kallikote, that there were job opportunities in
the gulf countries for women as domestic workers. They approached a travel agent in Kallikote
regarding the same, and sure enough, in four months he informed them of a rich
family in Kuwait who were in need of a domestic aid. They were offering Rs 5000/- per month besides a room for
accommodation. This brought hopes to
Jameela, who immediately grabbed at the opportunity and said she was ready to
go.
Mustafa’s
mind was in the dilemma that if she went, the children would be deprived of
their mother’s care, the major worry being the fact that she had never been
away on her own and spoke only Malayalam, but Jameela had made her decision. She
consoled her husband and children saying that she would work for a couple of
years and earn at least sufficient for the children’s education.
So saying, she got her passport ready with the help of the agent. She got her ticket to leave for Kuwait on
26-6-2003. The agent’s commission amount
shockingly turned out to be Rs 30000.
But with the faith that she will be earning enough on going to Kuwait,
she paid him by mortgaging her jewelry and left for Kuwait.
During
the next three months, Jameela wrote three letters to her husband, informing
him that she was doing well and she would send the money as soon as her
employer paid her. She also spoke to him
over phone a couple of times.
On
22nd September, Monday, Mustafa got a phone call. The caller spoke in Malayalam and gave the
phone to Jameela.
“I
have left the first job; I have left the house I was working in. I am calling
from a different place now”, she said.
Mustafa
thought she sounded troubled. “Why on earth would you leave your job?”, he
asked surprised.
“I
shall tell you everything the next time. . . “, the line went dead.
*****
Mustafa
got terribly worried. He did not have
any means to contact her. He approached
the travel agent but he said that it was not his problem to worry about. On repeated requests, he gave Mustafa the
contact number of the travel agent from Kuwait who had offered him the job
opportunity. This travel agent from Kuwait
was Karim Bhai who was an Indian , feom West Bengal. When contacted he said, “Jameela has left her
employer Mansoor Assadi. She has taken
away her passport with her. There is
nothing we can do.”
Mustafa
felt he had reached a dead end. An advocate of Somawarpet told him of the Human
Rights Protection Foundation. A worried
husband having no means to contact his wife approached the organization. The activists of the organisation obtained
copies of Jameela’s passport, visa and the agreement made with the
employer. They also contacted the
exchange and requested them to record all the phone calls made to Mustafa’s
number.
On
Monday, the October 6th, Mustafa received another call from Kuwait!
“I
can’t stay here anymore. Please take me
away from here as soon as you can!” she cried.
The previous owner had paid her only 50 dinar in three months and had
snatched away 30 dinars from her. When
asked where she was, she was not able to explain clearly about it, nor about
who she was staying with. But fortunately,
the activists could obtain the mobile number she had called from.
On
October 7th, an article was published on ‘Kuwait samachar’ and other
internet news papers seeking help from the Indians in Gulf. Several Indians responded on reading these
articles. The details of Jameela’s
passport and visa and the mobile number she had last contacted from were
provided to them.
When Human Rights Protection Foundation stepped in
The activists made many attempts to
contact the Indian Embassy in Kuwait.
Several calls were made, but
there was no response. Emails sent to
them bounced back. The same mails were
forwarded to the Indian Embassies in Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Riyadh, Muscat and other
neighbouring countries requesting them to send the same to the Indian Embassy
in Kuwait, but they failed to respond too.
The activists then contacted the Indian
Embassy of Kuwait with the help of the foreign embassy in Delhi but in vain.
There was also a possibility that
Jameela might have been kidnapped. What
if she had been moved to some other place!
The passport details of Jameela were
given to the Embassies of other countries in Kuwait, asking them to contact the
organization if they had any information.
But then none of them had provided any visa to Jameela’s passport. So there was some hope that she might still
be in Kuwait.
The news of Jameela was published in
Kuwait news, giving her details and the phone number she had last called
from. Following this a fax was received
from a gentleman named Philip saying he had been successful in contacting the
Indian Embassy as well as the number given in the news. No other details were
explained. Everyone hoped and prayed for
the well being of Jameela.
A
timid and nervous Jameela left Kallikote to the alien land! She spoke only Malayalam and broken
Kannada. She had no money.
What
had the agent in Kallikote said? “Don’t worry yourself! Karim bhai, an Indian, will be there to
receive you at the airport. You could
borrow some money from him till you are settled there.”
But
when she landed at Kuwait this Karim bhai was nowhere in sight. After 2 hours,
someone who introduced himself as a driver of her sponsor Mohammed Assadi took
her to the rich man’s home. She had no
way to confirm whether it was the same person who had called for her. She
prayed to God to give her strength to face whatever came her way.
She
was on duty from the next day after she had arrived. She had to wake up at 5 a.m.
in the morning and wash 3 cars, then sweep and mop the floors. She had to finish all this by 7 am and start
cooking. Later on in the day she had to
wash and press the clothes. Since she
was the only person to do all the work, it kept her busy till 10 pm. The ladies of the house went to bed by 10pm. But the men returned home only after 11 pm,
and Jameela had to serve them dinner and wash the dishes afterwards. It would turn past 1.30 am when she could
finally go to bed. But a similar hectic
day would start again at 5 am every day.
This
continued for three months. Jameela’s
health was deteriorating due to over work and over strain. She suffered a
terrible stomach ache on September 18th morning and she found it
impossible to get up from bed. The
family members ordered her to get to work immediately. When she motioned that her stomach hurt, a
huge bloke kicked at her stomach. She
screamed calling for Karim Bhai as tears of pain stung her eyes. The enraged Arabian threw her passport out
the window.
Karim
Bhai was summoned the next day. As soon
as he came he started beating her up. He
dragged her by her hair till his office.
He threatened her saying she would be taken to the police if she did not
obey her masters. She could not make out a word as he rambled on in Hindi. She was scared out of her wits.
However she had managed to gather her
passport which the man had thrown out.
On September 20th, she borrowed 10 dinars from the Pakistani
driver of the house, and took a taxi to the Indian Embassy which was 20 kms
away.
Jameela
described her woes to the officials but no one paid any heed. Finally someone
named Mammooty spoke to her in Malayalam and suggested her to find some work
soon or else the police would arrest her for not having a work permit. But
Jameela knew nobody there! She sat in
front of the embassy. She cried at her
fate as she thought of her family.
A kind, Tamilian lady who had come to renew
her passport approached her and listened to her problem. She consoled her and took her along to her
home assuring her that she would get Jameela a job through her husband. It is from their cell phone that Jameela had
contacted her husband. Since they had let Jameela stay with them illegally,
they were scared to give their address details to her. At last in about 10 days, a Sri Lankan lady
helped her get a job.
Meanwhile,
Human Rights Protection Foundation, Udupi had spread the news of Jameela in
Kuwait news. A gentleman, Mr Philip
Hemant was finally successful in contacting Jameela. The next day, “Udayavani” the local Kannada Daily published an article,
“Gulf Kannadigare, Jameelalige sahaya maaduvira?” (Dear Kannadigas of Gulf,
would you help Jameela?) Within a day,
22 youths contacted the organization and lent a helping hand by helping Jameela
in returning safely to India. (They wanted to remain anonymous and requested the
organization not to reveal their names).
Now
Jameela is back at HOME. She is broken
down mentally and physically. There are
burn injuries all over her body and she is undergoing treatment. The scars reveal many untold stories. She has heartily thanked the activist of the
Foundation and also the kind youths in Gulf who took pains for her release
from exile.
-Nivedita
Can these mishaps be prevented?
Reading Jameela’s story, one might
wonder if such problems arise all the time to all the people. The families with their children or relatives
may naturally fear for the safety of their dear ones. Consumers Forum, Basrur and Human Rights
Protection Foundation of Udupi has dealt with 32 such cases.
In order to make a survey regarding
this, the activists approached the travel agents of Udupi, Mangalore, Kallikote
and other places. They were asked on how
such mishaps could be prevented and how an awareness be created in the people.
“The agents in gulf countries notify us
of job offers asking for drivers, gardeners and domestic aides. We publish the same in the local newspapers. We send the applications and the medical
reports of the applicants to the agents who notified us. Our duty ends here”, declared the travel
agents who were queried.
“When people go there with our help, we
get the details of where they are posted.
But we have no way of knowing how they are treated or what happens to them
afterwards. 95 out of 100 people are
usually well settled. I can show you the letters we have received. But then there are also employers who
ill-treat their servants. The people are
advised beforehand to write about the nature of their work and of the
facilities they are provided with. There
is nothing we can do beyond this”, he added matter-of-factly.
Only a very small percentage of the
people who migrate to gulf countries in search of job opportunities are
unfortunate to land into ill-fate. But don’t
these people need protection? Don’t you think there is a need for deep thought
and understanding to actually find a solution?
Do you have any ideas to tackle these issues?
(Translated from "Janabhiprayada Mahapoora" by Dr Ravindranath Shanbhag)
