Hyderabad: Acting on the advice of the Telangana government, the Centre has shared the state wise database of Indians working in Gulf countries with states.
Minister for NRI affairs K.T. Rama Rao sought such database in May this year to provide legal, financial and other needy assistance to people from the state working in the Gulf countries in case of them getting stranded due to various reasons.
The Centre has provided database from 2015 till 2017 June end to all states. The data has been sent to the state NRI affairs department on Thursday.
This is for the first time that Centre has sent state wise date.
Reacting to this, Mr Rao said the data would be very useful for the government to devise an effective NRI policy for the welfare of non-resident Telanganaites working in the Gulf countries.
He said of late there have been many incidents of people from the state suffering in the Gulf countries some by languishing in jails, getting cheated by fake recruitment agencies or brokers, losing jobs, deaths etc. “But the state government could not extend assistance faster as we had no authentic details about them,” the minister said.
“I personally met external affairs minister Sushma Swaraj several times and sought state-wise data of Indians working in the Gulf countries. Similar requests were made by other states. I am happy that the Centre had approved our request and sent state-wise database, which will be of great help for all state governments to extend assistance to NRIs in case of any emergency," Mr Rao said.
As per the data sent by Centre, 36,006 people from Telangana were working in the Gulf countries in 2015. Of this, 10,716 were working in Saudi Arabia in 2015, 3,276 in UAE, 1,658 in Kuwait, 1,770 in Qatar, 6,577 in Oman, and 2,009 in Bahrain.
In 2016, the workforce decreased to 24,652. Of this, 10,776 were working in UAE, 4,933 in Saudi Arabia, 1,828 in Kuwait, 768 in Qatar, 4,004 in Oman, 2,343 in Bahrain.
By June 30, 2017, 8,819 people from Telangana left for Gulf countries. Of them, 3,897 are working in UAE, 1,123 in Saudi Arabia, 650 in Kuwait, 354 in Qatar.
