Congress MPs urge Centre to cut airfares for returning expats

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Even as the Centre is giving final touches to its repatriation programme for Indians stuck in the Gulf countries, Kerala MPs have urged it to provide free repatriation or offer reduced airfares. Shashi Tharoor, MP, highlighted the plight of ordinary workers stuck in West Asia, saying the government was insulting them by charging the poorest of them to return to their homes. 

“It was bad enough that poor migrant workers within India were charged to return home when they didn’t even have money to eat. Doing the same to poor pravasis whose remittances kept our economy afloat in hard times would add insult to injury. Yet that’s what the Govt intends to do,” he tweeted. 

He urged the state government to pay 50% of the fare of indigent expats and seek the rest of the amount as donations from expatriate associations in case the Central government is not willing to waive charges.
M K Raghavan, MP, wrote to the Central Government asking it to provide free repatriation or offer reduced airfares to the expats, who are in dire straits financially.