24 Hot Nails in The Body for Protesting Work Overload?
Ariyawathi, a Sri Lankan maid was sent back to her home country from her job in Saudi Arabia with 24 nails inside her body. Those nails were not in her body because she had an accident, they were deliberately hammered in.
I wanted to begin this article with the sentence—what has come to this world? But then I realized that this is not something new; I had seen medieval torture devices in the Tower of London, and knew very well that people in the past had been no kinder. Nevertheless, time has changed and human values have improved. The question is, when this happens in our time, what are we going to do to bring an end to this?
What was Ariyawathi’s offense? She had protested a heavy work load and lack of rest to her masters. That enraged them so much that they punished her in a bestial manner. Ariyawathi said, “The woman at the house had heated the nails and then the man inserted them into my body.” And there were 24 of them. While reading this I felt excruciating pain just imagining that scene, and I have no idea how much Ariyawathi had suffered. I cannot understand how human beings can do such a thing to others.
Saudi Arabia is the cradle of Islam, and according to the followers of the faith, it is the most peaceful religion on earth. If this is an example of that peaceful people, I shudder at the thought of how these people would be without their faith.
I had once lived in Abu Dhabi, and recall an incident when the youngest son of the ruler, Sheikh Zayed, killed a Pathan (a tribe from Pakistan) worker out of rage. Several thousand Pathan expatriates had encircled the prince in his hideout castle. Sheikh Zayed personally bought his son’s freedom and sent his errant son over to Germany to cool his heels. A couple years back, he returned to his country and was rehabilitated in his royal function.
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