KARACHI, Nov 21: Two young camel jockeys, commonly known as camel-kids, arrived here from Abu Dhabi by PIA flight PK 238 early Thursday morning.
Overseas Pakistanis Foundation general manager Mushtaq Ahmed, who received the children here, told Dawn that the family of the boys, both brothers, was still to be traced as the boys were very young and could not tell about their address or the name of village or town, etc. They would be kept in the Edhi Home till their family was located.
He said the children were brought to the Pakistan Embassy in Abu Dhabi by a stranger for renewal of their passports. The embassy staff became suspicious and kept the children with them. After it had been established that the children were camel jockeys, they were sent back to Pakistan.
Eleven-year-old Naimat Ali and his younger brother Shoukat Ali, aged eight years, told Dawn that the name of their father was Mohammed Husain and their mother’s name was Naimatey Bibi. They had four brothers and two sisters.
Naimat, who had been riding on camels in races for 5-6 years, said his father had taken him and his brother to Abu Dhabi six years back, and he had been riding on camels since then. His younger brother had been riding on camels for more than three years.
He said children were tied to camels during races so that they did not fall. However, sometimes children did fell from camels and were injured and they suffered fractures, and some of them died also.
The two boys had some old small injury marks on their bodies which, they said, were caused by fall from camels.
He said at least three children, Mukhtar, Ahmed and Sidi, died recently when they fell from camels. He said there were around 25-30 children and more than 300 camels on the farm where he lived. He said most of the children were from Pakistan, but there were some Bengalis, Sri Lankans, Sudanese and others also.
Naimat said his father, who worked as a mason in Abu Dhabi, visited the farm every month to take the salaries of his two sons from their arbab (sponsor). He said young camel jockeys were given a small quantity of boiled rice, chapati, etc, in order to keep their weight in check.
A large number of small children, aged 3-6 years, most of them from poverty-ridden Seraiki region in Southern Punjab, are smuggled out of the country to be used as camel jockeys.
The UAE government passed a law in the early 1990s which banned the use of children in camel races, but the law was not implemented strictly. A few months ago the UAE government announced that now the law would be implemented strictly.
