“We want more rights to survive,” said Afghan refugees unanimously, who continue to protest outside the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) office in Delhi. As the situation worsens in Afghanistan, these Afghan citizens believe, they’re facing a survival crisis in India as well.
Since they hold the stature of refugees, they aren’t entitled to apply for jobs, open bank accounts or educate their children in schools. Most of them are being subjected to an acute financial crunch since they’re jobless and their meagre income is now nearing a closure as more and more households and entrepreneurs are asking them to leave or resign in the aftermath of the pandemic.
“We’ve been living in India for 7 years now and it’s heartbreaking to believe that we don’t have any future. I used to work in a beauty salon but I was asked to leave as the pandemic-induced lockdown affected the customer inflow and I had to bear the brunt. My husband is stuck in Afghanistan and my elder son works as an attendant in a restaurant. We can’t even afford the rent of a room in which four of us, including my two daughters live,” said Sahiba, an Afghan refugee.
The sixteen-year-old Rumana works in a confectionery store, earning Rs 2,000 per month. “I started working in April 2020 as my father’s business incurred huge losses. His furniture business was somehow keeping us alive but with the Covid lockdown, everything changed. Since we don’t have citizenship, we can’t apply for jobs. Our family was on the verge of starving to death when I had to make a choice and that was the time, I decided to work anywhere to provide for my ailing mother and help my family survive. She has thyroid and needs regular medication. I want the Indian government to look at us.”
“My mother and father are in Afghanistan and I came to India with my wife and daughter in 2017. I had a carpet business and thought of expanding it to India but my business suffered. My wife and daughter are the only reasons for which I’m here and I love India, but I just want to be able to do a respectable job and provide for a better future for them,” said Zaid, another Afghan refugee.
The Afghan refugees, most of them with tears in their eyes, have been staging a demonstration in Delhi hoping for a reply from the government.
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