Saudi Gazette

JEDDAH — Indian ambassador Ahmad Javed urged Indian community living in Kingdom especially those living in remote deserts and faraway places to reach out to Indian diplomatic missions through digital mode.

He said that separate email IDS were introduced to cater to the needs of different issues such as death, jail. He added, instead of traveling from faraway places to the embassy in Riyadh, they can simply and effectively use the email to lodge their grievance.

He made these comments at a maiden Indian community meeting in Majmaah in central province recently, according local community members in the town.

Majmaah, strategically located on Qassim–Riyadh highway — one of the busiest and oldest highways in Kingdom, has a sizable numbers of Indians. There are approximately 100,000 Indians living in the area, as per estimates of Indian community workers.

If there are more than 50 passports for services, then embassy would include the town in its periodical visits to assist Indian nationals in the town and they need not to travel to Riyadh, Prominent Indian community member and key founder of the community school in Majmaah, Felix D’Silva quoted as the Ambassador as saying.

The community members also narrated their difficulties in traveling with newborn babies and their wives to the embassy to apply for the newborn’s passport. They also highlighted other issues that affect them.

Anil Nautiyal, first secretary of community welfare, briefed the members about the mechanism in dealing with the day-to-day issues and assured them full support from the embassy.

The community meeting was presided over by school principal Shoukat and Felix D’Silva, founding member of IISM, has welcomed the gatherings.

Prominent community members Backer, Prashant, Slaiy, Wassim Malik, Dr. Nasirudeen also highlighted various issues concerning the Indian community.

The NRI community in tiny town of Majmaah is overwhelmingly cheerful after meeting with Indian Ambassador for the first time Javed, along with Nautiyal, has been visiting small and medium towns in central, Eastern and Northern Border provinces, where Indian community is present, to get an insight into the state of affairs of the community.