Women losing their lives due to Nepal’s migration ban
Hira Bhujel was a proud migrant domestic worker. Her first migration from Nepal to Kuwait was legal, allowing her to buy land and build a home for her family. But overnight, her future became uncertain. The Nepali government placed a migration ban on women domestic workers.
Stripped of the ability to migrate legally, Bhujel felt she had no choice but to take an irregular route back to Kuwait. Her family’s livelihood was at stake. Like thousands of women pushed into irregular routes by restrictive policies, she found herself in highly precarious working conditions that left her vulnerable to exploitation and abuse—conditions ripe for modern slavery. When she became sick, her employer and the state denied her medical care. She returned home in a coffin within months.
“forgotten when they fall ill or die”
Nepal’s migration ban, imposed in 2017 and only partially relaxed in 2020, was justified as a “protective” measure. In reality, it forced women to migrate through unofficial and irregular channels, stripping them of labor protections and leaving them invisible to both governments and the law. And when domestic work is organized through such unofficial routes, the risk of abuse—from overwork and withholding of wages to physical and sexual violence—skyrockets.
Yet women keep leaving, driven by poverty, family obligations, and the lack of economic opportunities at home. Many never make it back alive.
The Annapurna Express reports that between 2008 and 2024, around 400 Nepali female migrant workers died overseas. Bhujel’s mother expressed outrage at the lack of basic decency shown to these women. She said:
Because she worked abroad without a permit, the government turned its back on us. No compensation, no clear answers…Women like my daughter are treated as disposable labor. She was sent away without protection, forgotten when they fall ill or die.
Moreover, the report Invisible in life and death found that families of deceased migrant women face “economic devastation” following their deaths. The loss of income often leads to debt, asset loss, and mental health problems such as depression, trauma, and isolation.