Dubai: Employers who file malicious cases against their employees with the Ministry of Labour will be prosecuted and penalised, a senior official said.

Humaid Bin Deemas, Acting Director of the Ministry of Labour, said:, employers, business owners and sponsors who report malicious absconding cases against any of their employees will be referred to public prosecution.

"Those who report malicious absconding cases against their employees also will pay to the ministry Dh10,000 fine and will have their company or companies file blocked at the ministry," Bin Deemas said.

Such an action from the employers will be considered as a kind of forgery and it will be taken as if those employers were providing the ministry with fake documents and data, Bin Deemas said. It will be dealt with in accordance with by the courts, he added.

"In case it is proved to us that the absconding case against any employee is malicious one, we are going to report the issue to the public prosecutor," he said.

Bin Deemas said on Saturday that the Ministry of Labour had set specific rules and regulations to accept any absconding case report against any worker.

Responsibility

"In case of reporting an absconding case at the ministry, it is a must for any company or employer to sign and stamp an undertaking at the ministry that they are responsible [for] all [the] information and details given to the ministry in that specific absconding report," Bin Deemas said. He added the ministry will file criminal case against those who file malicious absconding reports against its workers.

"If the worker proved within three months from the absconding case [being filed] against him or her that he or she [had] not absconded at the time of the absconding case filed against them, then the ministry will prosecute the employer and he will pay the fine and get his company or companies' file blocked at the ministry," he said.

Bin Deemas said the number of such cases reported to the Ministry of Labour was not very high.

"We always check and double check all the information mentioned [in] any absconding case before accepting it," he said.