Overview
The oil boom in the Gulf countries resulted in heightened interest for emigration of worker population from South Asia, particularly from India. Historically, it is difficult to trace the emigration of Indian labourers to the Middle East (ME) countries. We define the ME countries as Lebanon, Israel and Jordan, along with the countries that constitute the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), namely Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Qatar, Kuwait, Oman and Bahrain. This opening chapter largely deals with unskilled and semi-skilled migration to the ME countries from India and also highlights new emerging destination countries like Israel. This chapter touches upon three aspects: (a) the major challenges emigrants face in India (origin country) at the time of recruitment, (b) the vulnerability they face in the form of various kinds of exploitation and human rights violation including harsh working conditions (at destination), especially among female domestic workers and (c) the integration/rehabilitation of emigrants returning to the place of origin after the end of their contract period. With this brief introduction, the first section characterises the emigrant labour force from India to the ME countries, with more focus on Jordan, Lebanon and Israel, and the recruiting pattern followed in India to export workers. The second section deals with the major issues like undocumented migration, issues pertaining to female workers and other labour problems as well. In the third section, the future prospects for the emigration are briefly discussed. The last section briefly introduces the articles included in the volume.
Unskilled and Semi-skilled Migration to the ME Countries
The Gulf countries have the highest proportion of foreign nationals within their total population. Table 1.1 shows the share of foreign nationals in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries during the recent periods, 2010â16. Interestingly, with the exception of Oman and Saudi Arabia, the remaining four countries have a foreign population share of more than 50 per cent. The data also reveals that almost 90 per cent of United Arab Emirates and Qatar population consists of foreign nationals. Overall, the GCC countries together host the largest share of emigrant population in the ME countries (see also, Rajan 2012, 2015, 2016).
Table 1.1
Population and percentage of nationals and foreign nationals in the GCC countriesa
Country | Date/period | Total population | Date/period | Nationals | Foreign nationals | Per cent in total population | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Nationals | Foreign nationals | ||||||
Bahrain | Mid-2014 | 1,314,562 | Mid-2014 | 630,744 | 683,818 | 48.0 | 52.0 |
Kuwait | 31 March 2016 | 4,294,171 | 31 March 2016 | 1,316,147 | 2,978,024 | 30.6 | 69.4 |
Oman | 20 April 2016 | 4,419,193 | 20 April 2016 | 2,412,624 | 2,006,569 | 54.6 | 45.4 |
Qatar | April 2015 | 2,404,776 | April 2010 | 243,019 | 2,161,757 | 10.1 | 89.9 |
Saudi Arabia | Mid-2014 | 30,770,375 | Mid-2014 | 20,702,536 | 10,067,839 | 67.3 | 32.7 |
UAE | Mid-2010 | 8,264,070 | Mid-2010 | 947,997 | 7,316,073 | 11.5 | 88.5 |
Totalb | 51,467,147 | 26,253,067 | 25,214,080 | 51.0 | 49.0 | ||
Now moving to the Indian context, in the ME countries, especially in the GCC countries, the nature of emigration of Indians to the Gulf countries is unique compared to migration to other developed countries. The reasons are migration to the Gulf countries is dominated by unskilled and semi-skilled workers; they are basically contractual workers, and once their contract expires, migrant workers have to return home (Bhagat et al. 2013; also see Zachariah et al. 2002, 2003, 2006; Zachariah and Rajan 2009, 2012a, b, 2015, 2018). While there are several reasons of international migration, the primary aim of emigrants is to gain monetary benefits through migration and thus improve quality of life. Push and pull factors equally play a role in intentions to migrate overseas among economic emigrants. Push factors determine the scope of emigration from the origin country; so, in India, most commonly cited reasons for international migration are wage differences and unemployment. Though these reasons are primary, there could be some other specific reasons such as building house, funding marriage/dowry, providing education to children and meeting medical expenses. Further, pull factors determine the scope of emigration from destination or host countries. Most of the oil-rich countries attract emigration mainly for reasons like better job opportunities and higher income.
However, emigrants to the ME countries are a heterogeneous group with respect to demographic setup, legality of their employment and stay (visa), and most importantly, subnational group size, with each subgroup having their own characteristics at the destination countries. As reported by Ministry of External Affairs (MEA), Government of India (2019), unskilled and semi-skilled workers from India (hereinafter called Indian workers) in the ME countries are largely employed in five occupations: ordinary labour, mason, carpenter, technician and helper.1 Also, the Indian workforce in the ME countries includes legal as well as undocumented and trafficked workers (see also Rajan and Joseph 2013, 2015, 2016, 2017; Rajan 2017, 2018, 2019). The legal employments of Indian emigrant workers in the ME countries can be classified gender-wise and sector-wise.
India is not only the origin country for various emigrants but also the destination country for emigrants from Nepal, Bangladesh and Myanmar. Among the South Asian countries, India is the largest supplier of blue-collar workers. Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh (AP), Kerala, Uttar Pradesh (UP) and Bihar are some of the leading states in India that have fulfilled the demand for cheap labour supply to the GCC countries (Kumar and Rajan 2014; Zachariah and Rajan 2016; Rajan et al. 2017; Rajan and Zachariah 2019a, b). Hence, India remains one of the largest suppliers of cheap labour. In 1970s, India adopted a closed economic policy; consequently, labour migration for â3 Dâ (dirty, dangerous and demeaning) works first started to the GCC countries. Indiaâs lower-middle-class families are engaged in services or â3 Dâ works and considered as vulnerable workers. Many of these family members went to the Gulf region as expatriate workers on contract basis (DâSami 2000).
Before discussing about gender-wise and sector-wise recruiting pattern in India, an overview of existing legal recruiting system should be briefly discussed. Generally, in India, Emigration Act, 1983, is the only major legislation in place to regulate the workers going abroad to work. As mentioned in the Act, private recruitment agents (RAs) approved and enrolled within the MEA system are involved in the recruitment...