A migrant kind of love: Inside the long-distance relationships of Bangladesh's migrant workers 

Illustration: TBS

It was a gold nose pin, round, spiked and heavy. Sharmin's mother was happy to put it through her daughter's newly-pierced nose. Sharmin, a 26-year-old young woman – an age considered too old for marriage in Padma's char area in Rajbari – was nervous. A bit elated too, probably. 

"Our daughter will be happy, she won't have to starve or struggle as the groom earns a lot from what we have heard. The gold necklace and the nose pin look heavy," Sharmin's paternal aunt said. 

Sharmin is getting married to an expatriate, a migrant worker in Singapore named Mohammad Ali, who came to Bangladesh after six years, for three months. After tying the knot he will fly again, probably to return after another six or seven years. 

"Everyone that is married to a 'bideshi man' [migrant worker] says the distance, for so long, feels bad. I will also have to go through this. I don't know yet how it is going to be," the new bride Sharmin said. 

While the bride was expressing her fears for the future, the groom had his stories to share. 

"We 'migrant birds' might earn a lot, but we don't get to enjoy what we earn. We don't even get to celebrate our days with our families, nor do we have the luxury of enjoying a home-cooked meal. All we do is earn, with the hope that our families will be well-fed and happy," Mohammad Ali said. 

As the new couple were welcomed to the groom's home in the afternoon, the neighbours came to wish them good luck and see the new bride. Rashida was one of them, another migrant worker's wife, whose husband has been in Singapore for the last 13 years, with a gap in between.  

As the middle-aged Rashida sat with her 10-year-old son beside the red Benarasi sharee-clad Sharmin, it seemed as though Rashida was a hologram of Sharmin's possible future. 

"He is so far, for so many years. I have accepted it now. Besides I have my son, and my in-laws to take care of, where is the time to be sad," said Rashida with a dry smile pasted on her face.  

The Bureau of Manpower Employment and Training (BMET 2021) reported that over 11.35 lakh Bangladeshis – like Rashida's husband or the newlywed Mohammad Ali – migrated to foreign nations in 2022, the highest ever in the history of the South Asian country. Currently, an estimated more than one crore Bangladeshi migrant workers remain across the world. 

Their purpose is to secure better education, income and to improve their financial status (United Nations, 2002). But ill-prepared movements might bring negative outcomes for individuals as well as their families says a 2014 research paper by D. R. Shakya.  

Perhaps it does not take relationship experts to recognise that maintaining a long-distance relationship, or as social scientists are calling them 'transnational family life,' for years on end, is no walk in the park.

In a 2018 study, Kristel Anne Acedera and Brenda SA Yeoh talked about how the complex and unparalleled migration flows within and beyond Asia have given rise to the geographically dispersed "family" as a "new" form of living arrangement.

Now, according to relationship gurus of the internet, sustaining a long-distance relationship is tough, but they are some 'hacks' to make it work, like maintaining regular communication, surprising one another with gifts, finding ways to support each other and discussing the important aspects of your lives etc. 

A survey was conducted in Indonesia between 1993-2007 on the psychosocial consequences of out-migration (the process of people moving out of an area in their country to move to another area in their country permanently). It reported that the left behind spouses are more likely to suffer from stress-related disorders like hypertension and depression. They also face difficulties raising their children because of separation or a communication gap with their husbands. 

So we endeavoured to find out how the huge number of spouses in Bangladesh, whose partners are migrant workers, keep up with long-distance relationships for years, and what are some of the social paradigms they have to deal with. 

The two sides of the coin

Jasmin Begum, a 42-year-old woman, had difficulty surviving the night cold in Saudi Arabia. So she returned home after just two months of her employment as a maid there in 2019. 

In these two months, she was cautious about sending money to her husband who works in a clinic in Narayanganj. "He scared me by saying that he will marry another woman; that he will leave me if I don't send him my entire salary. 

But I didn't listen. I would send a couple of thousand Bangladeshi taka to his Bkash account and keep the rest in my bank account.

No woman wants to leave her home, her family and go so far. But [it's different] if you are cursed with a characterless husband, who refuses to provide for you," she said.

In the last four years, Jasmin took good care of her health and strengthened her immunity. And now she is making preparations to go back to her previous employment. She is determined to work there for the long haul this time, enough to have a good amount of money saved up so that she doesn't have to depend on her husband. 

On the flip side, we came across stories where women beat such insecurity, but that too came with a price. 

Popy converted to Islam from an upper-caste Hindu to marry her Muslim husband in 2012. After nine years of marriage, her husband went to Saudi Arabia for work and left Poppy behind with their only daughter. 

"My husband is very good, and so are my in-laws. They take care of me a lot," Popy said. 

"But still I always keep my voice down, I don't want to agitate him. I have left my family and home forever. I cannot go back. So there is a constant fear in me about what if he leaves me. Where will I go? I keep quiet. I stay within my limits," she said. 

"Maybe that is what has kept our marriage working even after the physical distance between us," she added. 

Absence of marital sex: Its ails and ripple effects 

Sohel went to Dubai as a migrant worker around five years ago. His job paid him well. The plan was to earn some money and settle back home after several years. 

But within a few months at work, the bad news started reaching him in Dubai. His mother told him that his wife was cheating on him with a young man in his locality. 

Sohel didn't believe his mother. Then one day, his family caught his wife sleeping with a man in Sohel's bedroom. The husband became nervous about losing his family. The couple already had twins. 

Sohel pleaded with his wife not to cheat on him anymore. The wife agreed to continue being married to Sohel under a condition: He has to send his salary to her account and send her jewellery. 

He complied. Things seemed well for a while. 

But when he returned home, he found that his wife had discreetly divorced him and married the man the family cautioned Sohel about. But the wife continued cashing in on Sohel. 

Sohel was devastated and was left with twin daughters to raise alone. 

In the rural country, there is a local proverb popular among residents - 'Shami Bidesh' or the husband is away. This proverb is used to associate a woman with the notion that 'because the husband is away for a long time, this woman might cheat on her husband with another man.' 

The act of infidelity occurs on the expatriate husbands' part as well. 

In 2014, a study was published titled 'Risky sexual behaviours and HIV vulnerability of male migrant workers in Rajshahi City, Bangladesh'. The sample size for the study was 200 male migrants in Rajshahi City aged 15 years and above. And the results showed that more than half of the respondents (60.20%) below 30 years of age reported engaging in sex with multiple sex workers in the countries they work. 

However, the sample size is too small and concentrated in a very small area. Despite the research's limitations, the study found that among migrant workers, those who are married accounted for the largest number of those engaging in paid sex. 

Fuad Ibne Sultan is a private detective based in Dhaka. He built a clientele that ranges from corporate espionage to extramarital affairs. "I often have clients who want me to investigate cases of extramarital affairs for them. A big chunk of them hires me from abroad. 

Both men and women who left their spouses behind in Bangladesh, sometimes, when they suspect they are being cheated on, ask me to monitor their partners," Fuad told The Business Standard. 

"In some of these cases, I see that my role is trivial as the client has already discovered what she/he wants to know about their spouse. They hire me to monitor and confirm that their suspicions are right," he added. 

When asked which countries have his largest client base, Fuad said, "My clients are mostly from Western countries. I don't get calls from the Middle East often." 

Bangladesh's migrant workers, however, are mostly based in the Middle East and some other Asian countries. 

The wife edition: Anxiety and hopelessness

Rashida, Poppy, Sharmin, Nasima, Shilpi and the women we talked to all were on the same page on one issue – they feel scared of what people will say about them and are burdened from all the work and responsibilities, and the lack of physical touch. All of this is coupled with the absence of a partner to share their struggles and challenges. 

Nasima and Obaidullah have been married for the last 21 years and in all these years Obaidullah had visited Bangladesh only four to five times. Finally, when he returned, he had severe heart disease and gangrene on his right leg.

The couple never had any offspring. So Nasima stayed in her parents' house most of the time and luckily her brothers didn't complain as she regularly received money to manage the expenses. 

"I couldn't stay with my in-laws; everyone sneered at me as I couldn't bear a child. Especially during any celebration or Eid, when everyone gathered, I was a topic of their discussion. I didn't have my husband beside me to support me. But my husband always trusted me," Nasima said.

After some years, Nasima was given one of her sister's sons to raise, Rakib. The boy is now all grown up and has left Nasima's house. Currently, Nasima raises another of her sister's sons and cares for her husband who cannot walk. 

"At least no one says anything to me anymore," she said. 

In their 2023 research paper, "Psychological state of wives of migrant and resident husbands: A comparative study in Bangladesh," Noor Muhammad, Sayema Rahman Rathi and Bijon Baroi discussed how spousal separation, lack of companionship and increased household responsibilities may trigger mental health problems in left-behind female spouses of migrant workers.

They interviewed a total of 200 women (100 women with migrant husbands and 100 women with resident husbands) selected from three areas - Munshigonj, Narayangonj and Dhaka city. Their age ranged between 22 and 45 years. 

The results indicated that wives of migrants display significantly higher anxiety, depression, and hopelessness as compared to wives whose husbands were living at home. 

In explaining the results, the researchers found out that when any woman's husband migrated abroad, she began to feel lonely and had to bear the burden of caring for their children. During the husbands' absence, her responsibility to maintain the family, reduced emotional intimacy and limited freedom in spending money – add to her woes. 

What about the children?

Sifat is 19 years old now and the last time he saw his father was more than six years ago. In these six years, he has grown up and has learnt to take care of his mother and the responsibilities of the family. 

"I feel more grown-up compared to my other friends. As we live in a village, my mother cannot move all the time. So it's me who goes grocery shopping; I am the one who has to deal with the brick masons for our home renovation," Sifat said. 

On Eid day, Sifat was one of the few boys in the Sreepur ward of Rajbari municipality who went to the mosque alone. "When I see others going with their fathers, I miss him. But I guess I have become used to it now," he said and smiled. 

A 2009 study from Pakistan reported a negative impact on the children of migrant workers. The study shows that children who are separated from their parents because of migration have improved economic status but they are twice as likely than other children to suffer from emotional problems. 

Unable to control him, Maya (a Narayanganj resident migrant wife) sent her son to a residential school that specialises in disciplining 'disobedient children.' "He is 17 years old now and for the last four years, I have tried three residential schools for him. 

"He was getting influenced by the bad boys, smoking cigarettes and disobeying me," Maya said.  

A life in between trust and insecurity 

Tahsin has been in Saudi Arabia for the last six years. He turns 30 soon, and most Bangladeshi men get married by this age. But he is not interested in marriage because "who will look after my wife back at home?" he said. 

"My parents have become old. If they were strong [young] enough, I could trust my wife with them. Now how can I leave a wife in their care?" he added. 

The insecurity in Tahsin that drives him to go on without marriage is shared by many other married and unmarried migrant workers in Bangladesh. 

During our interviews, we came across many – both men and women – who shared their grievances and their feelings of helplessness. 

But then we met people who have trust in their partners as well – plenty of them. 

The newlywed Mohammad Ali, for example, is over the moon. 

Many migrant workers don't get lucky enough to marry the love of their life because they don't get the opportunity to develop an affectionate relationship in the first place. 

Mohammad Ali, however, has known Sharmin for years and developed feelings for her. She, on the other hand, waited for him for half a decade, even though her relatives would say her age for marriage was passing by. 

"What is life if we cannot trust one another!" Mohammad Ali said. "She is the person I sought out for shelter, for peace, for love, even if we are hundreds of miles apart. We won't survive if we don't trust each other."

[We have altered several names as they requested anonymity]