Nitaqat deadline extended till December

Hyderabad: Saudi ruler King Abdullah-bin-Abdulaziz extended the deadline of Nitaqat by one more month (for the third time) and has given undocumented expats time till December 4, 2013, to have their status corrected. Nitaqat is a new Saudi labour law giving preference to locals.

The decision will provide relief to lakhs of migrants based in the Saudi kingdom, including 12,000 illegall workers from the state, said minister D. Sridhar Babu who is in charge of NRI affairs.

The state government will send a team of officials to Saudi Arabia in December to meet their counterparts there and ensure that AP migrants who do not have legal documents like passports, stay visas etc. get their exit pass.

“Out of the 12,000 illegally staying migrants from AP, 432 people have lost their legal documents. The Indian Embassy in Saudi Arabia has noted the details of the 432 stranded individuals and informed the state NRI department of the same.

These details were sent to the concerned district authorities to check their nativity, where these people have been identified. The Indian Embassy in Saudi Arabia is making efforts to send these 432 migrants home.

The migrants are also willing to return. The state will organise a special aircraft to bring them back free of cost and even rehabilitate them under various schemes like Rajiv Yuva Kiranalu scheme,” said the minister. This third deadline would allow many labourers from the state to complete their un-documented work and not be affected by the law, the minister said.

However, once this deadline expires, inspections by agencies such as the labour and interior ministries will resume in various regions and penalties will apply to violators.