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Remitted with love: Punjab, Kerala & migrant money
Published on Sat, Apr 26, 2008 at 23:29 in 
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SON AND SUCCESS: Gurmukh Singh says his life changed after his son went to America.
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Successful abroad, successful back home too
Indians working abroad sent over Rs 1.2 lakh crore rupees back home in 2007.
Appu P K worked hard as a worker abroad for 30 years to achieve his dreams: a big house, acres of land and the best education for his children.
True, he is away from his wife and children for most of the year but his family would never have had a comfortable life if he had not left his home in Chavakkad in Kerala. “I would have earned around Rs 200 monthly as a cook if had stayed back home but in the Gulf I earn more than Rs 23,000,” he says.
“When I left home in 1975, I didn’t have money or land. I first worked in Saudi Arabia and when I returned I bought land, constructed a house and put my children in school. I work as a cook in Muscat now,” says Appu.
At least 40 per cent of India’s international revenue is attributed to the remittances from Keralites. Around two million people from Kerala live abroad and another one million are temporary migrants, most of them construction labourers. The money this collective workforce sends back home is fast changing lives in Kerala.
“If you compare this 3 million to Kerala’s 32 million population, 10 per cent are directly exposed to international migration. It means one out of three Keralite is benefited by migrants,” says Dr S Irudaya Rajan, a scholar with the Centre for Development Studies in Thiruvanathapuram.
Money coming in from the Gulf countries now forms almost a third of Kerala's income and almost all of it is spent in housing or in savings. The number of NRI accounts in the state has increased by almost 20 per cent in the last few years.
Banks say NRIs are their top customers. “More than 25 per cent of our deposits are by NRIs. Dubai, Sharjah and Bahrain are the main countries from we where we get deposits,” says V Syam Kumar, branch manager of Indian Bank in Thiruvananthapuram.
Building palatial houses is the second favourite investment among immigrant workers. A house is a sign of social mobility and now there are so many of them that entire neighbourhoods or ‘Gulf colonies’ dot across the state. Strangely, many of these houses are either locked up or have no male member living in it.
The money sent by millions of Keralaites is not helping Kerala much though. “Kerala today ranks first in consumption, which is primarily remittance-driven. But the paradox is that remittance money has failed to increase investment levels in agriculture and industry in Kerala,” says Finance Minister Thomas Issac.
Money for Punjab
Thousands of kilometres away, in Gurdaspur village of Punjab, remittance money has helped farmer Gurmukh Singh too. He has just bought a tractor and is confident that good seeds and fertilizers will earn him a good harvest though unseasonal rains damaged his crops. His dairy business is flourishing and he over Rs 25,000 from it every month.
Gurmukh says he became prosperous after his son Rachchpal immigrated to California four years ago. “I owned just a small piece of land and after Rachchpal went to the US I was able to buy 25 acres. I also bought a tractor, a big car and a house,” says Gurmukh.
But where Punjab differs from Kerala is the way the money is being spent. Rachchpal went from his village to Bakersfield in the US. Starting as a truck driver, today he runs his own transport business and earns over Rs 2 lakh a month. He has bought luxuries for his family and also changed the way his father does business.
The Doaba region accounts for the most number of migrants from the state. With low water levels, agriculture was a challenge in this area. So many left for foreign shores. Today, NRI money—mostly from Canada and the US—is ploughing Punjab's economy forward. Over the last four decades, remittance money reinvested in agriculture has hiked farm incomes and changed the face of rural Punjab.
“Farming in Punjab isn't profitable. It's difficult to buy modern agriculture equipment from farming income but NRI money is helping in development,” says Agriculture Minister Sucha Singh Langha.
Rural Punjab is teeming with symbols of migrant wealth and aspiration. From schools to gurudwaras, Punjab's heartland is dotted with structures built with remittance money.
Over the last decade, NRI wealth has been mobilised through village welfare associations, like the one in Kharoudi, a village in Hoshiarpur district. Nine out of ten houses here have at least one person working abroad. A chunk of the money immigrants from the village sent back home goes to the village life improvement board.
Kharoudi is a model village: it has a community centre worth Rs 20 lakh, a theatre worth Rs 80,000 rupees and a development project worth Rs 50 lakh. There are only 600 people left in Kharoudi, but the village is prosperous thanks to the people who left home.
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Total Comments: 3
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Though remittances have helped kerala to provide good education and health care to the current generation, it has also resulted
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Kerala is not only remitting money with love but also spreads the message of international brotherhood to its core. Do
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The difference in Kerala and Punjab is how the two states are governed, and the attitude of the ruling parties
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