Jeddah: Some expatriates, whose visa professional status required qualifications, are feeling the heat in authenticating academic qualification documents. Besides engineers and scores of other technical job visa holding expatriate employees are required to authenticate their qualification certificates and enroll into professional bodies for visa renewal.
The foolproof system has eliminated forgery and counterfeiting of any document, yet some Indians are plunging into the wrong side of the law by submitting counterfeit degrees. In an ongoing series of cases, an Indian hailing from Telangana was sentenced to one year imprisonment and a fine of 5000 Saudi Riyals penalty an addition to deportation from the country upon completing jail term.
The NRI who was working as engineer had submitted purportedly Osmania University’s engineering degree that was later found as forged one.
Earlier, some NRIs were using counterfeit certificates to boost their employment prospects, however, now they unsuccessfully using it to retain their job visas known as Iqama.
This is not an isolated case but often such cases come to fore among South Asian expatriates as the Kingdom intensifies its efforts to curb the expatriates who continue their jobs without required qualifications.
It is noteworthy to mention that some expatriates had left their jobs and returned home to avoid penal measures prior to visa renewal.
The Saudi Council of Engineers (SCE) had said that some engineers working in the country are holding false documents, local media reports said.
The SCE is working to streamline the accreditation process of such certificates, it also mandates to refer any foreigner with fake documents to public prosecution.
The Saudi missions in India already begin professional test for 70 various technical jobs prior to endorsing the visa.
However, there are instances that Saudi immigration authorities detain such people even if they return to the Kingdom after longer years for Haj or Umrah.
In the past, many paramedics had obtained jobs in the health sector by submitting fake documents, though they were qualified in lower-level courses such as diploma or certification, yet they claimed to be graduates to boost employment prospects. However, authorities have effectively eliminated all of them.
| Posted by Sameer Khan | 
