Job loss, Aussie attacks kept Overseas ministry on toes

I / New Delhi January 01, 2010, 11:43 IST

Large-scale job loss among the diaspora due to the economic crisis and safety concerns of Indians in Australia, facing a spate of attacks, kept the Overseas Indian Affairs Ministry on its toes in 2009.

Responding to the severity of the retrenchment of Indian workers abroad, particularly in Gulf countries, following the economic downturn, the Overseas Indian Affairs Ministry set up 'Indian Community Welfare Funds' in all the missions in the region to provide support to immigrants in distress.

To further assist Indian workers with employment opportunities, the Ministry has also started ground work to set up Indian Workers Resource Centres in all the Emigration Check Required countries besides deciding to launch a comprehensive package to rehabilitate the Indians pink-slipped abroad.

The government also felt the blues of the Dubai debt debacle in November which had fuelled fears among families of over two million migrants from Kerala working in the Gulf, but its impact on the job market was not too severe as per preliminary estimates.

Overseas Indian Affairs Minister Vayalar Ravi said the government was not anticipating a surge of returnees to India from the region following the debt debacle as it was confident that the current crisis will blow over as it was much less in magnitude compared to the worse period of global meltdown.

As per estimates, nearly four lakh Indians returned to the country in the last one year.

The silver lining for the government was that despite recession, remittances from Indian workers had actually increased in the last fiscal which crossed USD 46 billion, up from USD 43.5 billion in the previous year.

The attacks on Indian students in Australia kept the government occupied since the middle of the year which asked Australian authorities to take all possible steps to ensure safety of Indians down under.

Ravi also visited Australia and asked the authorities to take all possible steps to ensure safety of nearly 95,000 students studying in the country. A total of 95 cases of attacks on Indians have been reported till the first week of December.

To allay apprehension, several top Australian leaders including Prime Minister Kevin Rudd visited New Delhi and announced a series of measures including reform in the immigration process besides assuring "zero-tolerance" approach towards such incidents.

On its part, the Overseas Indian Ministry decided to make it mandatory for education agents to get themselves registered with it to help track the whereabouts of students and ensure that they are not cheated abroad.

The Ministry also started the process of launching an ambitious project to create a data bank of all those going abroad to ensure their well-being.