#Qatar #migrant #death brings #despair to #family #left #behind in #Nepal Hari Prasad Phuyals #wife and #son #face #struggle to #survive two months after his #fatal #incident while #working for #construction firm Share 51 Email Pete Pattisson in Kathmandu The Guardian, Friday 24 January 2014 13.02 EST Jump to comments (6) Coffins of Nepalese migrant workers Bodies of Nepalese migrant workers at Kathmandu airport repatriated from #Qatar. Photograph: Pete Pattisson Pratima Neupane Phuyal was on her way to the market in Inaruwa, a town in southern Nepal, when she received a phone call she would never forget. The man on the line was ringing from Qatar, where her husband, Hari Prasad Phuyal, was working for a construction company. The message was brief and blunt. Her husband had died in an accident. As soon as she heard the news, she collapsed and did not regain consciousness for hours. I am finding it very tough. My husband, who was our sole breadwinner, is no more, Pratima, 24, sobs. I have a two-year-old child. I dont know how to care for him. I dont have any money as we were completely reliant on my husband. I dont even have a house to live in. The day before his death on 25 November, Pratima had spoken with her husband on the phone. We had a long chat. He even spoke to our son. Everything was fine. [But now] I am not sure what I will do to survive and bring up my child. I usually buy things on credit and pay it back whenever my husband sends money. Now he is no more, it will be very difficult to survive. Hari Prasad Phuyal, 28, had been working in Qatar for eight years, regularly sending money home to his wife and hoping to save enough to secure their future. It is hard to survive here as there are no jobs and land, Pratima explains. So he went to Qatar looking for a bright future and a good education for our son. But the news of her husbands death was only the start of Pratimas problems. At first she did not believe her husband was dead. When she phoned his employer they refused to give her any more information. It was even harder to repatriate his body. It was a long battle to get my husbands body back, she says. I had to call the company on a daily basis. Every time I called, the company said it is a police case and the process is continuing. I only received the body on 21 January, 57 days after he died. Pratima still does not know how her husband died. The medical report that I received with his body didnt say anything about an accident. It says blood was frozen in the chest. [A translator suggests blood clot would be more accurate]. When I saw his body it didnt seem there had been any accident as there were hardly any scars on it, she says. He was very healthy when he left home two months back. He didnt have any disease or anything. I dont know whether it was a heart attack or something else that killed him. Pratima is eligible for compensation from Nepals government and potentially from the company that employed her husband, but two months after his death she has not received anything. I havent got any compensation. I only got 1,500 Qatari rials (£250) with the body. I havent received my husbands salary either. I strongly recommend people not to go to Qatar, the country that took my husband. My younger brother is also in Qatar. He has not received a single rupee for the past four months. He called me last week saying he is finding it difficult to survive. So I would say it is better to do something in our country, than go to Qatar. theguardian/global-development/2014/jan/24/qatar-migrant-death-family-nepal
Posted on: Sat, 25 Jan 2014 13:01:37 +0000
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