By Irfan Mohammed
Saudi Gazette
JEDDAH — Nearly 100 expatriate workers belonging to a construction company alleged that their employer had abandoned them in a desert in central Saudi Arabia.
They said they had not received their salary for seven months and were even deprived of food, water and other basic necessities in the last two months.
The Dammam-based company deployed 96 workers from India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Philippine and Yemen to build a road in Adobiya village in Baagha, which is nearly 310 kilometers away from the provincial capital Hail. Some of the workers left the site and absconded after the company’s financial situation started worsening. Currently, about 60 workers remain in the remote desert camp, which cannot be accessed easily.
The majority of the workers are from different parts of India.
“It is an impossible task for us to move out of this remote desert place as there is no means of transport available. How we can go anywhere to complain,” asked Harihar, who hailed from Maharajgunj in Uttar Pradesh, India.
The company has stopped paying them salaries for the last seven months and it fully abandoned them in last two months, leaving the workers struggling for food and water, according Sarfuddin Thayyil, a community worker in Hail.
After visiting the workers in the desert camp Saturday evening, Thayyil told Saudi Gazette that workers want to return to their home countries making use of the ongoing general amnesty.
The workers’ residency permits have expired and their employer has switched off his mobile phone, he said. The workers claimed that they were not able to contact the employer for more than three months. Thayyil said the OICC team in Hail was providing food to the workers and trying to help facilitate their return home.
