Each week The National reports on someone in a desperate situation and the work of the Dar Al Ber Society in trying to help them. Today we look at the plight of a Pakistani man.
The Balochs have been living in the UAE peacefully for decades. They are what many would describe as “model” residents.
They have never even so much as committed a traffic offence. But in less than two weeks Mohammed Baloch has gone from model resident to criminal.
The Pakistani father of four now has a travel ban against him and a warrant for his arrest.
The 35-year-old’s world started crashing around him on February 24, 2013, when his 62-year- old father was admitted to a Dubai hospital.
“I brought my parents over from Pakistan for a visit. It’s usually me who goes to visit them but this time I thought the change of scenery would be good.”
The family were living in Dubai and Mr Baloch’s eldest sons, Ashar, 10 and Hassam, 8, had received top grades in school.
“Everything was fine but my father [Muhammad Siddiq] started feeling weak and tired. I took him to the hospital for a check-up.”
Little did the family know that this was the last time they would see him alive. “The hospital told me that my father needed a blood transfusion because his haemoglobin was low.”
Three hours after the transfusion, he went into a coma and was taken to the ICU.
“My whole family came to the hospital. We didn’t understand what was happening. My father was fine. He went to the hospital walking. Suddenly he was in ICU.”
Muhammed Siddiq died after 18 days in intensive care.
“The hospital later told us that he had non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma and a lot of other problems. We never knew he had all these things nor did the hospital inform us when we first admitted him,” Mr Baloch said.
Sadly, not only did he have to deal with his father’s death but also an enormous hospital bill.
“On his first day in the ICU the hospital asked me for Dh15,000.” The total bill amounted to Dh379,479.
Mr Baloch said he sold all his family’s belongings and borrowed to pay off a portion of the amount and for the hospital to release his father’s body. He still owes more than Dh280,000.
Mr Baloch works as an accountant at a travel agency and earns Dh5,000 a month. “I’ve sent my family back to Pakistan because I can’t afford to keep them here.”
He also moved out of his two-bedroom flat to his cousin’s place in Ajman.
“I was arrested for the first time in my life when I tried to go to Pakistan to spend Eid with my family.”
Mr Baloch’s mother had also had a stroke and his wife was due to give birth.
“They arrested me at the airport and said I had a case against me.”
He was released after his cousin paid his bail and he now awaits his next court date.
“I have no money. The money I make I send home to my family and pay the people I have borrowed from to pay off some of the hospital bills and to send my father home to be buried.”
Hisham Al Zahrani, manager of social services at Dar Al Ber Society said: “Mr Baloch never even had time to grieve the loss of his father.”
He said without the society’s support Mr Baloch would go to jail. “He will never get to see his newborn child or attend to his ailing mother.”
salnuwais@thenational.ae
