Md Farhad Hossain returned home from Saudi Arabia within five months of travelling to the country last year, as he was not given the job that was promised.
Farhad, a 23-year-old living in Tangail’s Gopalpur, said that he had migrated, spending Tk nearly five lakh that his family collected with loans from local lenders, selling a cow and a piece of land, hoping that he would bring prosperity to his family.
He migrated following all legal procedures, but it turned out to be a failed migration, and he returned empty-handed with an out-pass from the Bangladesh mission in the KSA.
Farhad now works as a construction worker far away from his house to avoid pressure from lenders, who have threatened him several times to return their money.
‘Any amount of financial support will be huge for me,’ he said.
Asked why he did not claim his insurance that the government started for migrant workers in 2019, Farhad said he had never heard of it.
‘For the first time, I am listening about the insurance from you now,’ said Farhad, asking if there was any chance even now if I wanted to apply.
Farhad, however, became ineligible for claiming insurance benefits as the government had set some rules for it, including application within six months of return.
Under the insurance coverage, family members of dead migrant workers can get up to Tk 10 lakh if they face an unexpected fatality within five years of their migration.
Injured migrants who return home within six months of their migration having failed to get a job will get Tk 50,000.
Like Farhad, a large number of dead, injured, or failed migration victims who are eligible for insurance claims are not getting their due benefits, mostly due to their lack of awareness.
According to the Wage Earners’ Welfare Board, only 1,677 migrant workers or their relatives have received insurance benefits in the past four years amounting to Tk 61.29 crore since the government started the welfare scheme.
Migration experts say that the number of eligible victims—dead, injured, and failed—is much higher than the beneficiaries.
However, many migrant workers and their families are still unaware of the insurance benefits.
They said that the agencies concerned did not take enough measures to let migrants and their families know about the availability of such a benefit.
Building awareness about the availability of insurance benefits and easing the insurance claim process could benefit more workers.
There is no specific data on how many migrant workers or their family members have been deprived of the insurance benefits, as the government does not have a database for returnee migrants as of yet.
Refugee and Migratory Movements Research Unit’s recent study estimated that around 50,000 migrants, who are eligible for insurance benefit in the category of untimely return in 2023, did not receive it mainly for not applying.
The number will be much higher if the deaths of migrant workers and the injuries of returnees are taken into account, they said.
In December 2019, the Wage Earners’ Welfare Board, in collaboration with the Bangladesh Jiban Bima Corporation, started the group insurance facility against a one-time premium of Tk 1,000 during migration clearance.
The migrants, who have Bureau of Manpower, Employment, and Training smart cards, will come under insurance coverage.
The BMET collects the mandatory insurance premium from each aspirant migrant while collecting other fees, leaving migrants hardly knowing about it.
WEWB officials said that nearly 33 lakh migrant workers had travelled overseas for jobs and paid Tk 330 crore as a premium against insurance since the scheme started.
However, 86,621 migrants returned home with an out-pass in 2023 only, according to the airport welfare desk data.
The RMMRU study found that 58 per cent of migrant workers who failed to get a job returned home within six months of their migration, and 15 per cent of them returned within one month.
WEWB officials said that more than five lakh Bangladeshis had returned home with out-pass from different countries since 2020.
WEWB director general Md Hamidur Rahman said that migrants’ welfare desks at the airport process the papers of dead victims, and thus their relatives get the insurance money largely.
But the injured and failed migrants who needed to apply for the benefits do not claim them out of ignorance.
He admitted that the insurance claim by the failed and injured migrants was very insignificant.
WEWB data shows that so far, only 303 failed migrants and 10 injured returnees have claimed insurance benefits since 2020.
WEWB officials said that as information was being passed among the migrants, the number of claims was on the rise.
Ovibashi Karmi Unnayan Program chairman Shakirul Islam said that the insurance did not cover workers’ health abroad, where they are deprived of their health rights.
He demanded to include health insurance with this and a mass campaign to make migrants aware of the insurance benefits.
‘The government can build a system to distribute all insurance claims to its beneficiaries without application,’ said Ovibashi Karmi Unnayan Program chairman Shakirul Islam.
He said that insurance companies as well as the WEWB should come forward with an awareness campaign.
BRAC migration programme head Shariful Hasan said that insurance for migration victims was a great initiative of the government, but no effective measures were taken to make people aware of it, resulting in low claims.
He recommended removing the flaws to avert failed migration in the first place so that very few people would require it and then increasing the amount for those who need it for an accidental event.
‘If we can develop facilities at the airport to collect data on all types of migrants, we can easily reach the victims and support them,’ he said.
Published on New Age
Rashad Ahamad 