5th Consultation meeting with State on Overseas Indians Concludes

The Ministry of Overseas Indian Affairs (MOIA) concluded the two-day 5th Consultation Meeting with the State Governments here today. The Consultation Meeting was held under the Chairmanship of Shri Parvez Dewan, Secretary of the Ministry to discuss issues relating to emigration and how best the Ministry could partner with state governments to provide necessary support in effectively addressing the concerns of Overseas Indians. The Meeting was attended by senior officials of MOIA, MEA and senior Government functionaries from major labour sending States such as Assam, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Punjab, Rajasthan, Bihar, Goa, Gujarat, Haryana, Jammu & Kashmir, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Odisha, Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal have been invited to attend the Meeting.

In the Meeting the States were appraised that the Government has revised the Indian Community Welfare Fund (ICWF) scheme for the larger benefits of the Overseas Indians which includes:

• Assistance towards boarding expenses per head by HOMs is enhanced from 15 to 30 days.

• Payment of penalties in respect of Indian nationals for illegal stay in the host country where prima facie the worker is not at fault;

• Payment of small fines/penalties for the release of Indian nationals in jail/detention centre;

• Providing support to local Overseas Indian Associations to establish Overseas Indian Community Centres in countries that have populations of Overseas Indians exceeding 1,00,000; and

• Providing support to start and run Overseas Indian Community-based student welfare centres in Countries that have more than 20,000 Indian students’ presence.

The State representatives were informed that in the last three years, Rs.21.70 crore has been spent from the ICWF to help 19,179 Indians. States were requested to give wide publicity to the scheme. They were further informed that the Ministry of Overseas Indian Affairs has undertaken eMigrate Project with a vision to transform emigration into a simple, transparent, orderly and humane process. The Project is an effort towards strengthening the regime of regular migration from India and minimizing the risk of irregular migration.

The States were requested to create awareness among the prospective emigrants for implementation of Mahatma Gandhi Pravasi Surksha Yojana which provides the overseas Indian workers a pension, a sum for return and resettlement and life insurance during the period of five years. They were also requested to strengthen the hand of MOIA in curbing irregular migration, launch regular publicity campaign to counter the menace of irregular migration, assist the Ministry in allocating space for the Migrant Resource Centres.