Editorial

More Awareness Required on Job Placements Abroad 
In these times of scarce jobs and the temptation of supposedly lucrative openings abroad, it pays to seek professional counsel and get informed better before paying up in advance and regretting later. Employment is an easy con to peddle. It has played out often in Sikkim and jogged warning bells recently with the arrest of one such dream merchant who fenced false promises of jobs in West and South Sikkim and then there is the continuing confusion of NEMSICS who took in deposits with promises of employment only to leave many savings severely compromised.
The latest to join this list of dashed dreams and lost money is the episode in which a Lingdum youth lost Rs. 2.9 lakh paid to a Siliguri-based “consultancy” which had promised him a job as a security guard in Afghanistan. Apart from the oddity of paying to get employed, that too as a guard in violent Afghanistan, the persuasiveness with which the carrot was dangled is clear from the fact that the youth’s family paid up Rs. 2.9 lakh as “consultancy and placement fees” to an organisation which is not even a registered Recruiting Agent. As per the law in effect on such matters, only recruiting agencies registered with the Ministry of Labour can conduct the business of recruitment for overseas employment. Even this, after they have obtained a Registration Certificate from the “Protector General of Emigrants”. As for the usuriousness of the consultancy fees extracted, the maximum service charge permissible for semi-skilled workers, under which category security guards apparently fall, is Rs. 3,000. The nearly Rs. 3 lakh charged from the complaining family is enough for the security deposit required to be kept with the Ministry of Labour to get registered to ship out up to 300 workers from India.
All the information shared above is easily available online, and the time has come for anyone planning for placement abroad to inform themselves properly. The Lingdum youth can be considered lucky in the fact that he did not fly out to Afghanistan. Two others who signed up with the Siliguri company along with him actually landed there to find nothing awaiting them. Their shock and fear on being stranded in trouble-torn Kabul can only be imagined. Although not confirmed yet, in all probability, they had been sent off on a tourist visa and not a working visa. This would mean that even if they stayed back and worked, they would have been illegals. There have been other episodes as well when youth from these parts have suffered extreme privations after trusting promises of well-paying jobs. Apart from ensuring that all youth who plan to either study or work abroad approach their options well informed and adequately aware, it is also necessary now for government agencies to step up and generate more awareness on these issues. Sikkim has a penchant for awareness programmes and goes into such extremes as teaching agriculture to people who have been farmers for generations; awareness is more urgently required for the new course that employment is taking in these parts. Placements abroad, especially in the Middle East and Afghanistan, are definitely more lucrative than what the common skill-sets can earn here or elsewhere in the country. Then there are the success stories of those who have returned richer and more experienced from these job junkets. It is only natural then that more and more youth are excited by the prospect and this eagerness, especially when coupled with the lack of confidence in their aptitude, leaves them vulnerable to cons. Enough such frauds have been played on the youth in these parts for the issue to be left ignored. Organisations like the Labour Department, or even the Directorate of Capacity Building, should be directed to undertake a series of awareness sessions across the State to explain the processes, the laws, rights, opportunities and risks involved in seeking jobs abroad. This can be easily delivered, and if coherently presented, would be an exceptional service to the youth.