Dubai: An all-women Indian family spanning four generations faces a bleak future as their only breadwinner has been rendered jobless and an unpaid bank loan weighs heavily down on them.
Living on community dole for three and a half years, the Sharjah-based family claimed they are caught between the devil and the deep as their only earning member can neither get a new job nor return home under the despairing circumstances.
The family, from the southern Indian state of Karnataka, comprises a widowed great-grandmother, 70, her widowed daughter, 51, divorced grand daughter, 26 and a six-year-old great-grand-daughter who has never been to school.
Tough times
The family’s tryst with the UAE began some 30 years ago when the daughter arrived with her husband. “Initially, I was a housewife but was forced to work to sustain the family after my husband died 12 years ago. I am my parents’ only child, so my widowed mother has been living with me for 25 years. I also have a divorced daughter who stays with me along with her daughter.”
She said: “When I started working, things were fine. During this period, I took a bank loan for my daughter’s higher studies and wedding arrangements in the belief that I could easily repay it. But I lost my job in 2011 and within a year everything changed. We could no longer repay our loan. Our financial situation worsened as my ageing mother needed medical treatment and my daughter went through a divorce.”
The woman said life has come to a standstill for the family. “I have an outstanding debt of Dh212,000 with a bank. I cannot raise this money unless I work, but I cannot take up a job here in the UAE or back home under the circumstances.”
She said the family has been surviving with the help of friends and charities. “The Indian Association Sharjah has been supplying us with basic food items like rice, flour, pulses, edible oil, etc, on which we survive. Charities have helped raise around Dh55,000 towards the loan repayment. But we are still [way] short of the target.”
She added: “We are desperate. Our visas have also expired and time is running out. We do not want to be on the wrong side of the law, but cannot get out of this situation without help. We appeal to kind-hearted people to help. It pains me that my aged mother’s medical treatment is being compromised and my little grand-daughter has never been able to attend school because of our situation. Please, please help restore dignity to our lives.”
Nissar Thalangara, former general secretary and coordination committee member of the Indian Association Sharjah, confirmed the association was providing free rations. “The family is in dire need of help. We have been helping them to the extent we can,” he said.
If you wish to help the family, write to editor@xpress4me.com.
You may directly contact the family at 050-9267653.
