Resentment is brewing among Keralites working in the Gulf and their families against the UPA regime at the Centre and the Congress-led UDF Government in the State for doing nothing in time to avert the forced departure of lakhs of Indians working in Saudi Arabia due to Saudization programme Nitaqat, which is expected to impact the Kerala economy in a terrible way.
Criticisms are mainly against Union Minister for Overseas Indian Affairs Vayalar Ravi, Minister of State for External Affairs E Ahmed, Chief Minister Oommen Chandy and Minister for Non-Resident Keralites (NRK) Affairs KC Joseph. All of them are accused of trying to shirk their responsibilities with respect to the plight of the Keralites working in the Arabian Kingdom.
As per rough estimates, a minimum of 1,50,000 Keralites may have to leave Saudi Arabia due to the Nitaqat programme, by which a minimum of 10 per cent of employees in every firm in the Arabian Kingdom should be nationals. Foreigners working in Saudi Arabia under free visas and outsiders running businesses as benamis of nationals also will have to leave.
Even when several lakhs of Indians are facing the prospect of having to leave Saudi Arabia in the new situation, the Centre — and the State — had not done anything to remedy the problems. The Saudi Government had initiated the Nitaqat programme as back as in November, 2011 and had informed New Delhi of it — Vayalar Ravi has admitted this — well in time.
Non-resident Keralites and Opposition parties allege that the Ministers in the Centre and State, who are responsible for finding solutions to such problems, are trying to shirk that responsibility by writing letters and making proposals to each other despite the fact that each flight from Saudi Arabia is bringing in scores of jobless Indians back.
It was only on Thursday, a day after the time given by the Saudi Government to companies for complying with Nitaqat norms ended, that Union Minister Vayalar Ravi and Chief Minister Chandy had made their first responses to the issue when the fact remains that the Saudi programme had started almost one-and-a-half years back.
“Even then, what did the Government doIJ” asks Sherrif Ahmed, brother of an NRK who could leave Riyadh any day due to Nitaqat. “Vayalar Ravi asked the ‘victims’ not to panic. Chandy wrote a letter, as he does over any difficult issue, to the Prime Minister. KC Joseph said rehabilitation measures were being taken. We all know what’s going to happen,” Sherrif said.
The Kerala Pravasi Sangham, an outfit of NRKs, will observe a fast at Malappuram on Saturday protesting against the inaction on the part of the State and Central Governments towards the issue and demanding the intervention of the Prime Minister. “Nitaqat had started several months ago but the Government did not do anything,” complained Sangham secretary KV Abdul Khader.
Pinarayi Vijayan and Pannyan Raveendran, Kerala secretaries of CPI(M) and CPI respectively, accused Vayalar Ravi of trying to simplify the tragedy of tens of thousands of Keralites working in Saudi Arabia. They asked the Centre to take up the issue directly with the Saudi Arabian Government and also wanted Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to take initiative for this.
Meanwhile, signs of Nitaqat in Saudi Arabia impacting Kerala’s economy badly have already become obvious. NRI deposits in banks in Muslim-majority Malappuram district, which is going to bear the maximum brunt of the Saudi move, plummeted by `462 crore since the start of the programme in the Arabian Kingdom.
NRI deposits in Malappuram had stood at `3,272 crore in March, 2012, four months after the start of Nitaqat. But this dipped to `2,810 crore by December and controlling officers of various banks admitted that such a dip was unprecedented. Of the 1.75 lakh Malayalees facing the prospects of return from Saudi Arabia, about 100,000 belong to Malappuram.