Kuwait to compensate 710 unpaid Indian workers of construction firm

The Kuwaiti government will compensate over 700 unpaid Indian workers of a leading private construction company who had to leave the country following a protracted labour dispute, the Indian Embassy in Kuwait said.

The Kuwaiti Ministry of Social Affairs and Labour will pay KD 250 (Rs 56,680) relief amount to each of the 710 employees of the Kharafi National Company, who were registered with the Public Authority of Manpower (PAM), and had left the country between November 2017 and April 2018, the embassy said in a press release.

The workers hailed from different parts of India, including Gujarat, Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal, Bihar, Rajasthan, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana.

Last year, over 3,600 Indian workers were left stranded in a state of penury for several months in Kuwait after the Kharafi National Company ran into financial difficulties.

In September last year, the Indian Embassy had submitted a list of 3,614 workers for compensation, but an agreement could not be reached on the modalities to liquidate the security deposits, the Kuwait Times reported recently.

The relief amount would be directly remitted into the workers' accounts, the report said.

Earlier this year, Minister of State for External Affairs VK Singh visited Kuwait and held talks with the authorities to find a solution to the issue.

The Indian embassy also pursued the matter and subsequently submitted a modified list of 1,262 people, out of which the PAM shortlisted 710 people eligible for the compensation, an embassy official told PTI over phone.

The embassy will take up the matter of the rest 552 workers with the Kuwaiti government again, he said.