Abuse, exploitation haunt women migrant workers

Abandoned by her husband, Rahima (not her real name), a mother of two, considered a broker’s offer of a job in Saudi Arabia as a lifeline.

In 2020, she left Narsingdi for Saudi Arabia on the promise of an “office job” with a monthly salary of 1,400 riyals (around Tk 46,000).

However, following her arrival at a recruitment agency guesthouse in Riyadh, she was not taken to any office. Instead, she was moved to a sprawling mansion where she was made to do hard labour for 1,100 riyals (around Tk 36,000) per month.

“I worked until 1:00am every day. Whenever I sat down to rest for a while, the madam at the mansion would holler at me,” said Rahima, now in her early 40s.

Her employer would give her very little food, often leaving her to scavenge leftovers.

“One day, I couldn’t bear the hunger. I went out and brought some food from outside. When they found out, they beat me mercilessly and locked me up for a week. I was hardly given any food.”

A few days later, she fell off a high stool while cleaning curtains. She suffered leg injuries and her lip was cut. Her employer gave her only painkillers and forced her to keep working.

As her condition worsened, she begged her employer to let her return home. Her employer then arranged a phone call with the recruitment agent who told her: “We bought you. If you want to leave, you must pay 1,500 riyals.”

She had to work with a limp for months because she couldn’t pay.

Physically and mentally broken, Rahima finally managed to contact the Bangladesh embassy after a couple of years, only to be sent back home without her last two months’ wages.

“The embassy staff kept me in their safe home for three days and told me to leave Riyadh since my employer had paid for an air ticket,” said Rahima who returned home in 2023.

Rahima’s ordeal highlights a broader pattern of abuse. While the Bureau of Manpower, Employment and Training (BMET) does not have specific data on women migrant workers who faced abuses abroad, the BRAC Migration Programme reports that at least 69,090 women have returned home since 2019. Many of them experienced physical, psychological or sexual abuse, food deprivation, unpaid wages, and excessively long working hours.

BMET records show that over 12.5 lakh Bangladeshi women migrated for work, primarily to Saudi Arabia (5.8 lakh), Jordan (2.09 lakh), the UAE (1.32 lakh), Lebanon (1.08 lakh) and Oman (1.24 lakh) between 2004 and 2025.

According to the Wage Earners’ Welfare Board (WEWB), the bodies of 799 female migrant workers were returned to Bangladesh over the past eight years. Most of their death certificates listed suicide as the cause, with the majority of cases reported from Saudi Arabia, followed by Jordan and Lebanon.

Official data show that women migrant workers filed 2,036 complaints with BMET between 2021 and 2025. Though 1,969 of those were “resolved”, the recruiting agencies accused of malpractice were not punished in most cases. For example, only 14 of the 110 agencies accused of wrongdoing last year were compelled to pay compensation.

These resolutions are frequently categorised as repatriation or administrative dismissals due to a lack of documentation and evidence, which are largely inaccessible to workers isolated in private households without access to their passports or contacts.

Several women workers who suffered abuse abroad told this newspaper that their employers took away their mobile phones immediately after they started work, cutting them off from the outside world. This is why they couldn’t contact embassies or their relatives for help.

According to the WEWB annual report, 395 migrant workers received legal aid from Bangladesh missions abroad in fiscal 2024-25, and only 11 of them were women. Most of the cases were linked to harassment allegations filed by employers or foreign authorities.

When contacted, Md Ashrafuzzaman, joint secretary of the Mission and Welfare Wing at the expatriates’ welfare ministry, said that safe homes overseen by Bangladesh missions abroad provide immediate protection and security to victims, support legal process, and facilitate reintegration or further employment.

He, however, acknowledged that gaps persist in implementation.

At present, Bangladesh has four overseas safe homes -- two in Saudi Arabia and one each in Oman and Lebanon.

Though women returnees or their families can file complaints through the expatriates’ welfare ministry and district BMET offices, many of them are either unaware of the procedure or choose not to take that path due to uncertainty over redress.   

Only cases of human trafficking, deception or exploitation by brokers or local agents fall under the jurisdiction of police in Bangladesh, ATM Mahbub-Ul-Karim, joint secretary at the expatriates’ welfare ministry, told The Daily Star.

Migration expert Mamun Ur Rashid said that when high-skilled professionals such as doctors or engineers migrate, they receive protection under the World Trade Organization (WTO) protocols (Mode-4). Their psychological well-being, medical needs, and social status are guaranteed, with specific safeguards for dispute resolution.

“For our migrant workers, there are no such safeguards; when the state focuses only on remittance figures, it forgets that these individuals have rights,” said Rashid, coordinator of the non-profit women’s rights group Badabon Sangho, which facilitates 20 forums across seven districts to transform the struggles of female returnees into collective action for systemic change.

Shariful Hasan, associate director of BRAC and head of its Migration Programme, said victims of abuses abroad have no viable path to justice.

“When a woman migrant worker escapes, her attempts to file complaints are often blocked by employers who file cases on various charges including theft… As a result, embassies prioritise repatriation over justice, leaving the victim with no avenue for redress.”

He emphasised that every case must be reported to host authorities to prevent further abuse. “Otherwise, one woman may return safely, but another will suffer the same fate.”

Hasan noted that unlike other nations that send delegations to check on workers, Bangladesh lacks a formal follow-up system.

“Regular contact such as monthly phone calls could help… Abuse often begins the moment a migrant worker’s communication with the outside world is cut off.”

Criticising Bangladesh’s “submissive diplomacy” in foreign agreements, Syed Sultan Uddin Ahmed, executive director of Bangladesh Institute of Labour Studies, said there is hardly any precedent where host authorities were held accountable for abuses of women migrant workers.

“Our policy is driven by the need for dollars. The mindset is: ‘Let them go any way they can, do any job, and send back dollars.’ This cannot be a state policy,” he said.

Rahnuma Salam Khan, national project manager of the International Labour Organization, said Bangladesh has strong rights-based frameworks on paper but enforcement is weak.

“We do not know how often agencies are penalised for unethical practices,” she added.

To break the cycle of abuse, Bangladesh’s labour law needs to be amended to allow migrant workers to form trade unions and associations, suggest rights activists.

They say such collective representation will help protect the rights of women migrant workers who currently do not have any bargaining power.

When contacted, Nurul Haque Nur, state minister for expatriates’ welfare, acknowledged that migrant workers’ rights often take a back seat due to restrictive laws and practical constraints in destination countries. “The government has not always spoken out or lodged formal protests as strongly as it should have.”

However, protection of migrant workers is now a top priority, he said.

“We are engaging with destination countries to prioritise workers’ safety, rights and ILO standards. Their lives, dignity and social protections will be secured.

“Previously, we lacked any mechanism for legal redress, particularly for the large number of distressed women returning from the Middle East, especially Saudi Arabia. There was effectively no platform to seek justice there,” he said, pointing out that the government already appointed two legal firms through its mission in Saudi Arabia to help workers pursue redress and compensation.

The ministry will ensure stricter oversight of recruitment agencies through a new grading system, he added.