Over 18,100 undocumented Bangladeshi workers were deported from Oman in 2018, a welfare board in Dhaka has said.

Quoting a report from Bangladesh embassy labour counselor Sujaul Hoque, the Ministry of Expatriates’ Welfare and Overseas Employment and the Wage Earners’ Welfare Board said in Dhaka that the repatriated included 17,800 male workers and 309 female workers.

“Most of the Bangladeshi workers became undocumented in Oman after they ran away from their workplaces due to enticement and under payment of wages,” said WEWB officials.

Talking to local media in Dhaka, the officials said that in last five years about 51,000 Bangladeshi workers became undocumented in Oman.

“At least 558 Bangladeshi workers are now serving jail terms, including 50 workers who had been detained and charged for murders and that their cases await trials. At least 20 Bangladeshi workers are serving life terms and one was sentenced to death in Oman,” the media reported.

A migrant worker in Oman can become undocumented, if he loses his work permit card or his passport, fails to renew them on time and run away from the employer.

Working in Oman without having valid work permit card is a labour law violation.

and 30, a total of 650 expats were arrested for violating the Labour Law and another 618 deported in one week, Oman’s Ministry of Manpower had announced.

The violating expat workers are arrested either directly during inspections and welfare checks in the employing companies they run away from or during raids carried out by the ministry concerned in neighbourhoods, commercial centres and shops, while some surrender voluntarily.

Their conditions are settled with their employers after reviewing their records to check if any expat worker is wanted by judicial authorities for crimes during the escape period.

Moreover, the ministry concerned sometimes announces an exceptional amnesty period to allow those expats to turn themselves in voluntarily for deportation.

The labour law also prohibits the employer from allowing any expatriate worker to work for others as the contract shall be in writing, including type of work, categories and wages according to the job or occupation of each worker.

It obligates the licensee to return the worker to the entity from which he was brought, if it is proved he does not meet the conditions stipulated in the contract.

During the first 10 months of 2018, the Ministry of Manpower (MoM) had arrested over 21,000 workers for labour law violations.