How a ₹340m campaign brought Kerala man home after 20 years in Saudi prison

For nearly two decades, Abdul Rahim’s return to Kerala seemed unlikely. Arrested within weeks of arriving in Saudi Arabia in 2006, the Kozhikode native spent 20 years in prison and faced a death sentence after a disabled Saudi teenager in his care died when a life-support device was accidentally disconnected during a car journey, according to Rahim’s account. Rahim was eventually freed after a global fundraising effort raised INR340 million in 'blood money' compensation accepted by the victim’s family, allowing him to return home this week.

Rahim had travelled to Riyadh seeking work to support his financially struggling family and found employment as a driver-caretaker for a Saudi family’s 15-year-old son, who relied on an external breathing device. According to reports, Rahim maintained that the boy died after the device became disconnected accidentally during a journey. Saudi authorities arrested him in late 2006 and later sentenced him to death, a ruling upheld through appeals.

What followed became one of Kerala’s most high-profile humanitarian campaigns. Malayali communities across the Gulf and beyond raised around INR340 million (about 1.5 million Saudi riyals) under Islamic diyah, or blood money, laws after the victim’s family agreed to pardon him. His death sentence was cancelled in 2024, although Saudi legal procedures required him to complete a prison term before release.

When Rahim landed back in Kerala this week, emotional scenes unfolded as relatives, supporters and neighbours welcomed him home after 20 years away. His return, timed close to Eid celebrations, reunited him with his elderly mother, whose brief prison visit in Saudi Arabia last year had been their first meeting in nearly two decades.