Disquieting news for my friends from Kerala.
Times of India, Mumbai edition, 3/8/13, writes on a study covering 10,100 Indian respondents in the Gulf Cooperation Countries.
"Saving not an option for Indians in Gulf"
One case study quoted: A.P. Satish Kumar, a technician in Dubai, earns 3,500 dirhams (around Rs.58,000) a month and lives in an apartment that he shares with five others. He pays 1,500 dirhams (Rs.25,000) for a tiny room in the apartment and with the 2,000 dirhams (Rs.33,000), he eats frugally, takes care of essential needs and send whatever is left to his family in India.
Around 5 million Indians work in the Gulf – of which around 4.5 million or 45 lakhs from Kerala. Most are blue collar workers. They earn barely enough to sustain themselves. Saving is not an option. They work hard in extreme climates and ensure tough living condition to remit as much as they can to their families. The study found that only 2% of their families have savings from money that they have received. The study found that despite making sacrifices and leading a life of comparative deprivation in an affluent society, most Indian expatriates stand to gain no long term benefit (like PF or gratuity or other deferred benefits) from working in the gulf.
SATISH KUMAR, ONE OF THE PRIME MOVERS OF THE STUDY, SAYS HE WOULD ADVISE YOUNGERS WHO DREAM OF WORKING IN THE GULF TO THINK IT OUT CAREFULLY FIRST.
(Me: The fossil fuels – petroleum products – as found in the Gulf region are a fast depleting sources of energy and may last for another 50 years. What then for people from India, especially Kerala? The high social development indices in the state are thanks to the petro-dollars send by these emigrants working there under extreme conditions. If the State has seen no industrialization worth the name since Independence, the blame largely rests with the local populace and no use blaming politicians or successive governments because the politicians running the government are all elected by the people themselves and the politicians are not demons or devils descended from Hell and themselves rise up from the ranks of ordinary, lay people, the aam janta.
It should be kept in mind that no other state in India – all parochial themselves making sons-of-the-soil first in job reservation – will accept so many job-seekers from Kerala.
What beats one is why can't the Malayalis who are so disciplined, obedient and hard-working in the desert-like Gulf countries, be so in their own state and help build a business-friendly culture in their state?).
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