Thirty-eight Nepali migrant workers, who had been stranded in Saudi Arabia, will be taken back to their previous jobs.

An agreement to this end was signed in Kathmandu between the workers’ relatives and the foreign employment agency that had sent the workers to Saudi Arabia.

As per the agreement, the workers will get salary and other facilities as mentioned in their contracts as well as the due wages. The workers have also been offered the option of returning home.

The Employment Services and Empower Services in Mitrapark, Kathmandu, had sent the workers, including 13 from Khotang district, to work for Sonmar Almamalakha, an advertising company. However, they stopped going to work after the company refused to pay them.

All 38 workers were then evicted from their company quarters in July.

After the incident, their relatives had filed a case at the Department of Foreign Employment with the support of People’s Forum under the SAMI Project in Kathmandu.

The department had interceded with the representatives of Sonmar Almamalakha to address the plight of the Nepali workers. The agreement has offered some semblance of respite to the stranded workers, said Buna Bishwakarma of Safe Migration Information Centre in Diktel, Khotang.

She said that the workers were still not completely convinced that their old company was going to take them back and pay them their outstanding wages.

We will rejoin the company only if the Nepal Embassy gives us full assurance that our jobs will be secure this time, Sheshan Shrestha of Jalapa, Khotang, in a telephone interview.

Published on: 27 August 2018 | The Kathmandu Post