The eldest in a family of three sisters and two brothers, Jha felt it was too good an opportunity to pass up. His father, a helper in a dispensary with a monthly income of Rs 1,200, agreed and the two signed a deed with the local moneylender, borrowing the sum at 8 per cent interest per month. On May 6 last year, the school dropout boarded his first-ever flight and took off to Qatar, the coastal desert peninsula on the western flank of the Arabian Gulf.
Though not as well known as its other West Asian cousins " Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates " Qatar makes up for what it lacks in size (a land area of approximately 11,437 sq km) with its reserves of petroleum and natural gas. It is a new job haven, especially for labourers from India, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and, of late, Nepal. Jha had his first misgiving when after landing he had to wait at the Doha airport for more than four hours. There was no one to receive him and not knowing Arabic, he couldn't communicate with the airport officials. It was past midnight when he was finally taken to his destination, the labour camp of his sponsors and employers, Qatar Building Engineering Co (qbec), one of the biggest in the country.
Nothing that Giri had told him had prepared him for the Umm Said camp. Away from the bright lights and architectural marvels of Doha city, the industrial area lies in bleak desert land. Except for sparse patches of grass bleached yellow by the relentless sun, there is no vegetation. Instead of trees, the landscape is marked by mammoth skeletons of rusting steel and rotting wood, huge piles of cement and stones and towering rubbish dumps. The industrial area is both the dumpyard and cradle of the city. Cheek by jowl with abandoned decaying machines and shanties are new constructions " more offices, more factories. By 6 pm, when the blazing sun goes down, an eerie silence descends and the desolation is complete. This is the area where many major Qatari companies put up their labour camps.
Imagine a row of plywood shacks measuring about 10 ft x 6 ft. Lined up against all four walls are two-tiered metal bunks. The remaining space is taken up by more bunks, on an average, 34 to a room. Thirty to 40 men are allotted a room that has no windows and only one or two airconditioners and fans. Often the fans do not work and the ACs are switched on only after 5 pm, despite the outside temperature being a searing 52 degrees Celsius. Apart from the bunks, there is no other furniture. There is no privacy either, not even when you bathe. A row of tiny cubicles where there is no space after you lock yourself in do duty as both bathroom and toilet. The grime on the chamber pots is visible even from outside, all the more so as some cubicles do not have doors.
While qbec " owned by Mohammed bin Faisal al Thani, who is related to the Emir of Qatar " stands to make a huge profit once its multi-million riyal (1 riyal = Rs 11.25) City Centre project in Qatar is completed, a large number of the workers, hired from Third World countries, have not been paid their wages since January.
The City Centre, a 320,000 sq m project that will have a shopping complex, a 400-room four-star hotel and eight residential and office buildings, employs nearly 1,400 workers. Of them, according to the Indian embassy, 625 masons, carpenters, pipe fitters and unskilled labourers from India, like Jha, would have been starving if the embassy had not stepped in from May 22.
'Whoever set up the Indian Community Benevolent Fund deserves thanks, ' says a diplomatic source. 'The Indian embassy is in a sound financial position today because of it. Every two days, it allots 2,000 riyals to buy the workers essential foodstuff like rice, pulses and potatoes. qbec obviously did not like it. They asked us sneeringly, how long we'll be able to do it! We said for two years more, if necessary. ' The agitated workers have struck work and are demanding to be paid their dues and sent back home. They are mostly from Uttar Pradesh and the 24 Parganas district in West Bengal.
'We pooled in money and faxed sos to people in India, ' says one. 'We've written to prime minister Atal Behari Vajpayee and Mamata Banerjee. But no one has bothered to take up our cause. '
We are fortunate that at least nobody has written back from India asking us to drop the matter, ' the sources add. 'It's happened in other countries. But unless there is more public awareness in India, things will continue to be like this. We had once blacklisted a recruiting agent and all the newspapers in Kerala carried the information. It beats us why people still come here, duped by them. '
'The thought of all that money was a big temptation, ' says an embittered Paran Mondol, a 45-year-old carpenter from Kola village in 24 Parganas. 'Rebati, an agent in 24 Parganas, told me I could earn Rs 10,000 to Rs 15,000 a month if I came here. I mortgaged my land and raised Rs 60,000 on 10 per cent interest a month to pay him. I started work on February 6 this year. Instead of paying me the promised 900 riyals, they initially tried to pay me around 200 riyals. I refused to take it. It wouldn't be enough to pay for my meals, let alone send money home. '
Apart from non-payment of wages, being beaten up or abused is a regular feature, say workers. Embassy sources say qbec is notorious for undercutting other bidders. 'They float the lowest tender as well as ask for the least time, ' they point out. 'So there's this insane hurry. A lot's at stake. ' For the expatriate worker, it also means doom. Two Pakistani masons were crushed to death in January when two floors collapsed. Less than a month later, another employee fell off a 6-metre roof, breaking his right arm. He later told local reporters he had been paid nothing since October, save the 300 riyal advance when he arrived.
When The Peninsula newspaper contacted qbec managing director Yahia al Attar, his response was: 'It's none of your business. ' Says Fakir Biswas, a carpenter from Bonga, 'We are treated like animals, like slaves. When the officers lost three passports due to their own carelessness, 795 riyals were deducted in each case from the workers' pay for the new passports. They dock our meagre wages under the slightest pretext. They even dock electricity and water charges and yet switch off power supply from 5 am to 5 pm in the camps. We have to get drinking and cooking water from the latrines. '
The Indian embassy says the workers had been complaining for long. When contacted in March, al Attar told the embassy that things would be settled amicably. But the complaints kept mounting. Matters came to a head on April 23 when the embassy received a call from the Umm Said police station, saying that 200 workers had decided not to report for work, demanding their wages. Though the embassy contacted qbec, the company ignored the call.
The next day, though, they were forced to come to the embassy when around 150 workers went there to lodge their protest. qbec promised to pay all the workers 500 riyals the next day and clear their wages by the following week. They also promised to put the workers on wages instead of contract, pay for health cards and give them resident's permits. But even towards the end of May, qbec showed no signs of doing anything. Finally, on May 25, nearly 350 workers staged a dharna at the embassy. 'This time we decided to involve the capital police, ' said an embassy official. 'It was more than a labour problem by now. It was a downright criminal offence. '
An agreement was signed between qbec, labour department officials, the police officer on duty and Mohammed Salim Khan, on behalf of the workers. qbec again agreed to settle all payments, book return tickets for the workers and complete immigration formalities in a week.
But on June 1, the Al Khor police arrested five workers, including Khan. 'The charge against him was that he'd tried to kill a qbec official in the morning, ' says an embassy official. 'But he was in the embassy till evening. ' Khan had earlier worked in Saudi Arabia and was wiser to the ways of the West Asian world. That, the diplomat says, was the real reason for his arrest.
Khan and the other four " Anil Kumar, Aslam Khan, Chhotu Ram and Bablu Khan " are still in jail. But the men responsible for their plight are flourishing. Embassy officials say Phoenix Recruiting Agency, run by Rakesh Sharma from New Delhi's Kailash Colony, had hired the workers through a countrywide network of subagents. Subagents like Rebati reportedly collected around Rs 50,000 to Rs 60,000 from each recruit.
Giri himself works for qbec as foreman and is said to be getting his wages regularly. When one of the workers spoke to his recruiting firm on the phone, complaining of non-payment, Giri reportedly threatened him with dire consequences.
'The plight of the workers will never be publicised in Qatar, ' said the diplomat. 'Shaikh Mohammed is close to the Emir and no one wants to protest fearing it may lead to deportation or worse. After all, they are all in the Gulf to make money. Even a philanthropic organisation run by expats from Tamil Nadu kept mum and stayed away from us after we approached them for help to do something about the plight of Indian housemaids here. Every day, we have two or three cases of these poor girls running away from their employers and seeking sanctuary in the embassy. We are a nation of millions, yet back home, there isn't a single protest. ' And the brawn drain continues.
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