Hom Karki

Migrant worker Lal Bahadur Syangtan of Chainpur-7 in Sankhuwasabha, who had gone to Qatar for employment three years ago, is returning home after being seriously injured in an accident.

Syangtan had flown to Qatar on July 2, 2010 and was working there as a worker to repair water tanks. However, on May 21, 2012, just two weeks before his flight back to Nepal, he met with the accident while he was working with his Punjabi friend in an underground water tank. When both Lal Bahadur and his friend connected a machine to an electrical socket and started drilling holes in the tank, all of a sudden a fire sparked, engulfing the whole tank. “I could not open my eyes as the whole tank was engulfed in flames. I felt unbearable pain then,” he said.

He said he managed to get out of the tank and saved his life though his body had already caught fire. He fell unconscious then and was rushed to hospital in an ambulance. He said he regained conscious after 48 days in the hospital as almost all his body parts were burnt in the incident. He spent around four months in the hospital.

Meanwhile, though a government agency in Qatar recommended his company to provide him with around 282,000 Qatari riyals (which is 141 percent of his insurance), his employer compensated him only 192,000 riyals in August 4. “The company officials said I was compensated as per my life insurance and that was only 100 percent,” he said.

Published on: 18 August 2013 | The Kathmandu Post