KATHMANDU: Kabita Dahal from Maipokhari, Illam is currently working in Oman. She has been working there for 58 weeks (near about 5 years) now. She has never returned home in all these years.

It is the fear that is holding her in Oman – fear of not getting permission from the Labor Department and likely disapproval from the company she is currently working with.

Kabita Dahal, when contacted from social media, says, “The Government of Nepal has scrapped the provision of sending women to Gulf countries just after 4 months of my arrival to Oman. My contract has already ended two years and three months ago.”

She adds, “The house I am working in is more secured than Nepal. I earn Rs 50,000 here every month. There is not much hard work here. My employer gives me off-days and asks me to go on leave but I have been lurking fear that once I reach Nepal, the government will not allow me to come back.”

She fears to lose her job and regular monthly income, which she says has been petrifying her. “I keep on staying in Oman even during off-days which my employer gives every year,” she says. The Government of Nepal has taken one general view about the domestic maid-servants working abroad without carving any exceptions.

Not all the domestic maid-servants from Nepal are working in bad environment leading to their physical and psychological exploitation. “The blanket ban like this has always disfavored those who are working in a good environment and make us lose our regular source of income. I request the Government of Nepal not to put a blanket ban on Nepalese women desirous to work in foreign countries as house-maids,” she says adding, “The government must find out some other way so that people like me who are not suffering in foreign land must get a chance to rejoin the job after coming back home in Nepal.”

It is to note down here that the Government of Nepal had banned Nepalese women workers from leaving Nepal for foreign employment 4 years ago. The impact of this decision, though aimed at saving the Nepalese women from physical and psychological exploitation, has gone in against of interest of those who are already working in foreign countries.

It is because they are not in a position to return home as they fear that the government will not allow them to rejoin their job where they are working. In fact several cases of physical abuse, financial misappropriation and psychological torture of Nepalese women working as house-maids in foreign countries came into light.

The government was forced to take legal recourse as a result of which ban on traveling of Nepalese women in foreign employment was imposed.

Sabita Chhetri from Dhankuta has been staying abroad in foreign employment for 5 years. She has not come to Nepal even once in these years. She is all safe working in a shop but cannot return Nepal all due to strange laws of Nepal.

“I have a family. My son was in Grade-7 when I went for foreign employment. Now, he has passed Grade-10. I remember my family every day and weep in privacy as I cannot do anything because of the government policy,” she complains.

She says she cannot come back because the government will stop her from rejoining her job from where she is currently earning Rs 45,000 besides facilities of free food and lodging.

“Everything will be lost and my entire family will come on the road. I stay in contact with my family on the phone and through social media. My labor contract has already expired but I am staying here in another employment. What to do? There is no other way,” shares Sabita.

Leela Limbu from Dharan also undergoes the same plight. She left for Malaysia 4 years ago and has not been able to return to Nepal. The reason is the same fear of the government policy which debars Nepalese women from traveling abroad for foreign employment.

It is because of her job in Malaysia she has been able to educate her children and nourish other family members. She has made repeated inquiries from the Embassy of Nepal in Malaysia regarding her comeback to join her job in Malaysia. But, her fear inside due to the clear policy of Nepal’s Government banning Nepalese women going abroad in foreign employment has not gone. She is still working in Malaysia by staying illegally there.

Like Kabita, Sabita and Leela not less than two hundred thousand Nepalese women are working illegally in Malaysia and other Gulf countries. For the last 4 years, the government of Nepal has not been able to decide what to do with this blanket ban on Nepalese women going abroad in foreign employment.

This has stopped so many Nepalese women working overseas from coming back to Nepal. The Committee on International Relation and Labor of the legislature-parliament of Nepal in the year 2072 BS had issued the advisory regarding the ban of Nepalese women going abroad to work as house-maid.

After the government has imposed a legal ban on Nepalese women traveling abroad for foreign employment, human traffickers have become active to smuggle several of the Nepalese women out of Nepal to foreign lands. This has further added up complications in the life of these women.

Just recently, 200 Nepalese women were nabbed for going abroad via Bangladesh and India. These women were heading to Malaysia and Gulf countries by taking illegal routes. Human traffickers entice the Nepalese women in name of jobs and send 20 of them outside Nepal on a daily basis, says the study conducted by a social institution.