SRIJANA SHRESTHA

Refute claims that they were rescued by Indian govt

As he landed in Kathmandu, Bodhi Prasad Aryal felt as if he had narrowly escaped from the jaws of death. Despite his travails in the war torn Libya, he is elated that he has finally come home to live with his family.

“I feel as if I have escaped from the jaws of death,” says Bodhi Prasad. He, however, finds it difficult to explain the conditions in which he and other Nepali workers were forced to live in after the company they worked for closed down. 

He worked for “Doosan Heavy Industries and Construction” in Sirte almost for a year and returned home penniless. He spent Rs 2, 15,000, which was all he had saved, to purchase his ticket to Kathmandu from Tunisia. “I spent everything I had earned to buy a return ticket to Kathmandu,” he rued, adding, “I don´t know how I will feed my family now?” Aryal, 34, who originally hails from Nawalparasi, was cheated by an agent and taken to Libya though he was promised a job in Saudi Arabia. 

Gopal Dhamala is another worker who has returned home. He feels he wouldn´t have been alive had he stayed in Libya. After staying at the company´s camp for nine days, he led a team of Nepalis and ran out of the camp in Sirte to Tripoli. Gopal said he had no idea that the government does not allow Nepalis to work in Libya and had great difficulty returning to Nepal from the war-torn zone. 

“But working in a foreign country is a compulsion for people like us. Gopal, who was also cheated by manpower agents, had been promised a job in Malaysia. He was taken to Thailand via Malaysia and then to Libya. He had paid a total of Rs 400,000 to the agents. 

Altogether 54, among the many Nepalis stranded in Libya, have arrived home and have refuted media reports that they were rescued by the Indian government. They claimed that the Indian government did not pay for their tickets. “Nobody helped us. All of all paid for our tickets ourselves,” said Gopal, who spent almost Rs 300,000 to return home. “The Nepal Embassy in Cairo and the Indian Embassy in Libya had arranged for our exit permits from Libya to Tunisia but we all paid for our returns tickets.” 

After Doosan Heavy Industries and Construction closed down without making any arrangement for their return, as many as 126 Nepalis workers had contacted the Embassy in Cairo to rescue them. The Nepal Embassy in Cairo had then urged the government to make necessary arrangements for their rescue. 

“The government hasn´t decided as to whether it would pay for air tickets to rescue the Nepali workers stranded in Libya,” said Prakash Subedi, chief of West Asia and Africa division at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.  According to the Nepal Embassy in Cairo, there are almost 125 Nepalis who are desperately waiting to return home. Around 50 of them do not have money to buy return tickets while others are waiting for the authorities to issue them exit permits.

The government has banned Libya as an employment destination but the government estimates that around 500 Nepalis are currently working in Libya.

Published on: 18 August 2014 | Republica