The great equaliser

Pappu Mahara's campaign for RSP began in Malaysia as he came to Nepal with a suitcase plastered with PM Balendra Shah’s photo.

Last week, after what he considers a “job well done” he was flying back to Malaysia with a suitcase without the election poster but with high hopes for his, and Nepal’s, future.

On Thursday, the day of his flight, the first session of Parliament was underway. Addressing the House, RSP Chair Rabi Lamichhane made an apology to Nepal’s Dalit community.

Pappu was traveling to Malaysia with Lalit and Abhinash and all three are members of the Dalit community working in a factory to provide for families back home. Migration is an equaliser: it connects talent which is universal with opportunities that are not. It allows people a fresh start no matter their circumstances.

What we do not talk about as much, however, is that this equaliser itself is not equally accessible. Access to migration requires money, networks and information – all of which are unevenly distributed.

Among the three, Abhinash was part of an initiative by Migration Lab and the group International Manpower Recruitment targeted at the Musahar community to make meaningful migration accessible to all. He did not pay a single penny. He got exactly the job he had been promised.

Abhinash and other Dalit youth may still have migrated despite not having money, but they would have had to borrow to pay hefty recruitment fees to fraudulent agents. The Musahar cohort included workers who were victims to passport confiscation by middlemen without any job placement.

As they prepared to fly back to Malaysia after a 45 day break, the three workers were examples of how targeted labour mobility can be designed to ensure migration benefits the poorest.

One answer is scale: reaching more marginalised communities with ethical recruitment pathways so more people can benefit.

The other is to link them to countries offering even higher salaries and better protections for migrant workers.

Abhinash and others would have typically gone to India, a low-cost, low-risk and low-return destination, but they went to Malaysia where returns are significantly higher. But returns are relative: a Nepali in a Malaysian factory earns a basic salary of $422. The same factory job in Korea would pay $1,500 per month. In both cases, overtime hours add to the income.

But there is a catch. Barriers to entry are higher for countries like Korea. Workers have to learn the language and pass a test, unlike Malaysia when an employer interview is sufficient. We helped youth prepare for the job interview so they could show up in the best way possible and pass. But helping workers with language preparation is a wholly different proposition.

In interactions with youth from the Musahar community, I have often asked them informally why they do not opt for Korea. Abhinash, Lalit or others could easily pass the Korean language test if they put their minds to it.

There is lack of information (even misinformation) about migrating to places like Korea. Village-based agents will not share information about the Korean labour market in the villages because it is a government-to-government initiative where brokers have no role at all.

While not a representative sample, many youth I spoke with do not know such details: how to apply, what the benefits are and how much it can cost. Abhinash thought that it costs upto Rs800,000 to migrate to Korea, which is not true. Actually a Korea placement costs just Rs70,000 which can easily be recuperated in less than a month.

There is also a network barrier. Musahar youth I spoke with did not know a single person who had migrated to Korea or Japan. Not knowing anyone who has attempted to go to Korea or Japan makes it daunting and out of reach.

We have witnessed this first hand in the case of ethical migration in Malaysia. Word of mouth is one of the most important sources of job information for workers. Friends of Abhinash and Lalit ask us if there are similar ethical opportunities. It takes just one cohort to change perceptions of the unknown, we have learnt.

Lalit is setting up a WhatsApp group with peers from his village who also wanted to get jobs without recruitment fees. He already has a friend that he put in a good word about,

“My friend is very smart and educated, but has never worked in his life,” he says. It was an honest referral, but not a blind one.

When we create labour mobility initiatives, a part of the wider goal is also to enable such knock-on effects like building networks, role models, mentors, and reliable sources of information. Only then can we eliminate fraudulent actors.

The government’s apology to the Dalit community for historic discrimination has to be followed through with concrete action. This means creating job opportunities, including for foreign employment that are transformational.

This is in line with RSP’s own manifesto. Goal number 80 states: ‘Families from Dalit and marginalised communities who wish to go abroad for employment will be provided with concessional loans through banks based on recommendations or guarantees from local authorities.’

This commitment can be realised in many innovative ways so people from marginalized communities have access to not just any migration but the most rewarding, safe and transformational ones.

Unlike India, Malaysia and the Gulf, access to high-return markets like Korea and Japan has a more rigorous preparatory and selection stage. What barriers, for example, do youth from underserved communities like the Musahar face in accessing language preparation classes? Are there gaps in finances, social networks or reliable information that can be addressed? Can they access high-quality instruction? Sometimes, the barriers may be invisible like our own limiting beliefs stemming from unfamiliarity and lack of guidance and role models.

Publicly available administrative data on outmigration is not disaggregated for caste and other factors to help who is migrating, and by extension, who is not.

Not all migration is the same, and Nepalis understand this all too well. Some return worse off than when they left, others are engaged in “survival migration”. Some come back having built assets or to build thriving businesses. A successful returnee contributing to Nepal is inevitably a function of their migration experience: how much they earned, saved, learned, and were protected.

The earlier we become intentional through better program design, training partnerships, recruitment practices, and employer selection, the more likely it is to create positive and lasting change for migrants and their families. That we have an action oriented, proactive government gives us hope.

We met Abhinash when he had doubts about whether he could actually migrate without paying fees. Now, back home for a break, he encouraged others to migrate ethically directly through recruiters and avoid middlemen. He has bought land, and now plans to build a house on it within the next two years.

A youth from the Musahar community or someone from Bajura should have the information and resources to migrate for rewarding overseas jobs if they wish to do so and to break out of the broker-trap that puts them in vulnerable positions. The new government should undertake measures to ensure that this great equaliser is also equally accessible to all.

Upasana Khadka heads Migration Lab, a social enterprise aimed at making migration outcomes better for workers and their families. Labour Mobility is a regular column in Nepali Times.