The government has started studying the effectiveness of the free-visa, free-ticket policy for Nepali migrant workers amid pressure from private recruitment agencies to increase service fees.

The highly ambitious provision introduced in July 2015 aims to obligate employers from the seven labour-receiving countries–Malaysia, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Bahrain and Oman–to bear the cost of visa processing and air tickets to hire workers from Nepal.

According to the Department of Foreign Employment, 84.4 percent of the workers obtained new permits to work in these seven countries in the first nine months of the fiscal year ended mid-April.

During this period, 605,798 Nepali workers obtained new approvals or renewed their foreign work permits. The number of workers–institutional and individual–obtaining new approvals increased by 51.5 percent to 387,839 and those renewing their permits rose by 5.5 percent to 217,959.

Remittance inflows soared by 24.2 percent to Rs903.39 billion in the review period against a decrease of 0.2 percent in the same period of the previous year.

Nepal received an all-time high amount of more than Rs1 trillion in remittance in the last fiscal year.

Following the implementation of the free-visa, free-ticket rule, migrant workers were expected to pay only the cost of pre-departure orientation training and health check-up and contribution to the migrant workers’ welfare fund.

Workers needed to pay Rs10,000 to the recruiting agencies in service charges, only if their employers refused to bear the cost.

But, eight years since the provision came into effect, it has largely remained on paper. Workers are still made to pay a hefty amount in recruitment fees, insiders say.

Kabiraj Upreti, deputy spokesperson for the Ministry of Labour, Employment and Social Security, told the Post that a nine-member task force had been formed to study the effectiveness of the free-visa, free-ticket policy, among other issues in the foreign employment sector.

“The task force will examine if the Rs10,000 service charge provision needs to be reviewed amid increasing reports of workers being cheated,” said Upreti. “The task force consists of members from the Law and Foreign ministries, Joint Trade Union Coordination Centre, Department of Foreign Employment, Foreign Employment Board and civil society experts, among others.”

It is expected to present a report to Labour Minister Sharat Singh Bhandari.

Rajeev Pokharel, joint secretary at the Labour Ministry and head of the task force says they have four terms of reference: Management of the service charge under the free-visa, free-ticket scheme, provision of more effective pre-departure orientation training, legalisation issues regarding workers who go for foreign jobs through visit visas, and enlargement of the scope of the employment service centres established at local levels.

“Besides the free-visa, free-ticket policy, we also have the zero-cost model called the employer pay model. The government had once announced that Nepali workers would have to pay Rs50,000 as service charge for labour migration to Singapore,” said Pokharel.

“The study is actually aimed at finding ways to address inconsistencies in Nepal’s labour migration policy besides observing the existing practices in other labour-sending countries,” he added.

The rule requiring Nepali workers to pay for Israeli jobs under the deal signed in October 2020 was severely criticised and was seen as a reversal of Nepal’s commitment to promoting fair and ethical recruitment.

Senior labour migration expert Ganesh Gurung said the government should not do the work of manpower agencies in the first place; but if it does so, it should send workers under the zero-cost scheme.

“Making workers pay for South Korean jobs also contradicts its policy of promoting zero-cost jobs,” said Gurung.

The task force began work around a week ago. “We have been given three weeks to submit a report, but it may take longer,” Pokharel said.

Under the zero-cost model, the employer is responsible for all the fees and costs of labour migration, including the service charges of recruiting agencies for facilitating the hiring process.

The memorandum of understanding signed between Nepal and Malaysia in 2018 contains a provision that exempts workers from paying recruitment charges as the Malaysian employer must bear all the expenses of recruiting workers.

But migrant workers and researchers say that is not happening while private recruitment agencies insist that the implementation of the free-visa, free-ticket policy or the zero-cost policy is almost impossible as there are not many employers who want to foot the bill.

According to Pokharel, the recruitment agencies have argued that if they were allowed to collect a service fee equal to one month’s salary of the workers, it would add to the transparency of the recruitment fees.

Rajendra Bhandari, president of the Nepal Association of Foreign Employment Agencies, reiterated that only a few employers pay the service fee to recruitment agencies.

“The service charge needs to be increased for the sustenance of private recruiting agencies without which the implementation of the free-visa, free-ticket scheme is impossible,” said Bhandari. “A fund can be created to reduce the burden of recruitment costs on workers.”

Gurung said it was absurd to ask that workers should be engulfed in debt for the sustenance of recruiting agencies.

Labour migration experts argue that any move to make workers pay more in recruitment fees would be a step backwards in ensuring fair recruitment.

“While hiring workers under the zero-cost provision has been on the rise across the world, it looks like Nepali authorities are trying to create an environment for recruitment agencies to legally scam migrant workers,” said Gurung.

“The government should instead start searching for employers in foreign destinations who will hire our workers under the free-visa and zero-cost schemes as recruitment agencies are only going to demand more in service charge in the coming days.”

Gurung sees Nepal’s weak presence during labour deals as a major reason for the failure to implement worker-friendly schemes.

“Our authorities need to realise that demand for Nepali workers is high in labour destinations, and we should stop sending our workers to countries which cannot ensure zero-cost jobs,” Gurung said.