Families of more than 500 Nepali migrants working in Saudi Arabia have registered complaints at the Department of Foreign Employment, asking the government to facilitate their repatriation. Those stranded in the Gulf kingdom are helpless after their employers stopped paying them.Hundreds of companies in Saudi Arabia have closed down in recent months due to slowed growth as the kingdom suffers the effects of lower oil prices while many others have been unable to pay wages to workers.
More than 4,000 Nepalis have pleaded for help through embassies or other agencies such as the department, Hello Sarkar and Nepal police. Officials said the exact number of stranded workers
may be much higher as many do not approach the embassy or authorities due to constraints including the lack of access to communication facilities.Saudi Arabia, host to an estimated 600,000 Nepalis, was the largest recipient of Nepali workers in the fiscal year 2015-16. The country hired a total of 138,529 Nepalis in the past year alone.
“Complaints from Saudi Arabia accounted for more than 75 percent of the total received by the department. They were mostly related to nonpayment of wages,” said Govinda Prasad Upadhyaya, who heads the complaint department at the DoFE.
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