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Labour pact between India and UAE by next year: Envoy

By Sanu George, IANS

Thiruvananthapuram : A labour pact between India and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to safeguard the interests of the Indian workers in that country would be in place by next year, India’s envoy to the UAE Talmiz Ahmad said.

India and the UAE signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) in December last year to safeguard the interests of the Indian workers in that country and to ensure their welfare.

Ahmad said he was confident that, when in place, it would be fair, transparent and effective.

“Both the UAE government and the Indian embassy would act as the watchdog to this longstanding demand,” the ambassador told IANS.

Based on the agreement, a joint three-point programme was finalised by both the Indian mission and the UAE government wherein it includes transparency in the contracting system.

Henceforth, there would be a contract between the employer and the employee and it would have four copies, with copies given to both the UAE government and the Indian embassy.

The other significant aspect would be the scrutiny of all existing contracts and also the setting up of a grievance mechanism cell in the UAE.

“We have already cleared a MoU to this effect and have submitted it to the UAE government. This MoU has been based on all the inputs that we have received to make the entire contracting system transparent,” said Ahmad.

Ahmad is on a visit to Kerala and is meeting the concerned government officials.

“A lot of fine tuning is required to have a transparent system, and the crucial aspect is to streamline the entire recruitment agencies in India. See, the UAE government has no control over these agencies and hence it is the government of India and state governments which have to work out the checks and balances,” said Ahmad.

There are approximately 1.4 million Indians in the UAE.

He said that he has already begun discussions with the UAE government on the issues concerning women workers from India in the UAE.

“A minimum wage level will be worked out, good working conditions is a must and providing access to the India embassy is also being discussed,” said Ahmad.

“We are confident that all these issues would be settled and a proper system would be in place by the latter half of next year because till now all that was there was an ad-hoc arrangement. To have a permanent and transparent system, I wouldn’t mind taking a bit more time than originally planned,” said Ahmad.