‘My children did not attack Iran’: 2bn South Asians suffer from distant war

India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Nepal are together home to nearly two billion people, about 23 percent of the world’s population. Even before the war on Iran, the region depended heavily on imported energy, much of it from Gulf countries.

But the extent and nature of exposure of different South Asian countries to Gulf supplies and the Strait of Hormuz varied significantly.

Now, they are all feeling the effects of the prolonged and expanding war, as more and more supply routes become choked.

South Asia’s dependence on Gulf energy

India imports about 85 percent of the crude oil it consumes – it is the world’s third-largest crude importer.

Before the war, Gulf producers, including Iraq, Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Kuwait, were among its major suppliers, while Qatar was a leading source of liquefied natural gas (LNG). India has a more diversified supply network than its South Asian neighbours, with crude also arriving from Russia, Africa and the Americas.

Pakistan is also highly dependent on imported energy, particularly crude oil, petroleum products and LNG. Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Kuwait have traditionally been important oil suppliers, while Qatar is its main long-term LNG provider.

Bangladesh produces natural gas domestically, but increasingly relies on imported LNG as local production struggles to meet demand.

Qatar is one of its main LNG suppliers, while the country also imports refined petroleum products.

Nepal has no direct crude oil or LNG imports from the Gulf. Instead, the landlocked country relies on India for virtually all of its petroleum products, including petrol, diesel, kerosene and LPG. Its exposure to Gulf disruptions is indirect: higher costs or supply shortages in India can feed through to Nepal’s fuel supplies and prices.

India faces the largest exposure in absolute volumes, while Pakistan and Bangladesh have fewer alternatives for some critical energy supplies. Nepal’s dependence is one step removed, but disruptions to India’s energy supply chain can quickly reach the Nepali market.

As is often the case, it is the poor and economically vulnerable who are bearing the brunt of the crisis.

‘Financially, I feel completely helpless’

Sajida Jibran is a 45-year-old housekeeper in Pakistan’s southern coastal city of Karachi.

She works long hours in an affluent neighbourhood, has a husband who can no longer work due to health issues and she has three children in middle and high school.

Jibran says her rent has gone up from 15,000 Pakistani rupees ($54) at the end of last year to 25,000 rupees ( 90) this past month.

“Before the war, everyone could eat and drink. I could buy meat, chicken, but since the war started, even vegetables have become so expensive that it is difficult to buy them,” she said.

“The price of electricity has increased a lot, our bill used to come to around 1,500 [rupees] ($5.4), but now it starts at 5,000 ($18). The gas bill is also very high and comes to a minimum of 2,000 rupees ($7),” said Jibran. Natural gas bills in Pakistan have historically been minimal because it was locally produced, but having depleted its reserves, Pakistan largely imports natural gas.

The hardest decision Jibran has had to make was to stop paying her children’s school fees: she could either educate them or feed them.

“I had always hoped that my children would study, get a good education and have the opportunity to attend good schools. I can barely manage to put food on the table. Beyond that, there is very little I can do for them.” she said. “When I see my children sitting at home, unable to continue their studies, I can’t sleep, day or night. Financially, I feel completely helpless.”

‘The rising prices are making everything unaffordable’

Balendra Singh is a security guard in India’s national capital, New Delhi. The sixty-seven-year-old lives in a small room in Noida, a city adjacent to New Delhi, with six of his family members. After the US-Israeli war on Iran broke out, he had to send some family back to his village in Lucknow to curtail expensive city life. Lucknow is the capital of Uttar Pradesh state, in which Noida is too.

 

“I cannot afford to feed so many mouths in a big city today. The inflation has gotten the better of us,” Singh said. “The rising prices are making everything unaffordable – and our salaries stay the same.”

Singh explains how it’s not about what they are putting on the table to eat, but it’s how many people are eating in an expensive city like Noida.

Singh doesn’t own a vehicle, but feels the pinch of rising fuel prices in the extra cost of the rickshaw rides he needs to commute to work.

“The base prices of rickshaws have risen. Even if that rise is five rupees, it is really big for us – because in a month, that’s like 300 rupees ($3) increase for to-and-fro travel to work,” he says, before describing how he and the remaining members of his family in Noida are adapting to the higher cost of living. “We may eat fish once a week rather than thrice a week and put fewer onions in the gravy.”

Singh says when the LNG supply was disrupted earlier in the war, he and his neighbours started using old wood-based fuels. He says he knows the smoke is harmful to health but they had no option — all because of a war that he says he and his country have nothing to do with.

“My children did not attack Iran. My children do not support this war. But we are left here to bear the burden of faraway politics. I want to appeal to the government to take measures to insulate us from the rising prices.”

Pressure spreading through households

Asma Begum is a housewife, mother of two and works as a domestic worker in Bangladesh’s capital, Dhaka.

She works in one household, washing dishes and doing other domestic chores, earning around 5,000 taka a month ($41). She would like to earn more, but there appears to be less domestic work available.

“Rich people are also under financial pressure,” she said. “They are trying to manage the household work themselves without keeping domestic help.”

For Asma, that illustrates how the cost-of-living pressure is spreading from one household to another: families facing higher expenses cut discretionary spending, including paid domestic help, which in turn reduces the income opportunities available to lower-income workers like her.

“Everyone has the same problem,” she adds. “We all survive by working.”

Asma says that the strain is not limited to her household. Her parents live in the southern coastal district of Barishal. Her father and brother work as construction workers in the same neighbourhood, while her mother cooks at a mess, despite suffering from cancer.

“They are struggling in the same way.”

‘The cost of everything has gone up in recent months’

Gyanu Basent works as a porter in the Gaushala area of Nepal’s capital, Kathmandu. Aged 58, he is the father of a 15-year-old and has his ageing father and siblings as dependents too.

Basent never went to school and had to move to Kathmandu to find work.

“We used to do farming before, but monkeys won’t let us do agriculture. Also, a local cooperative in the village embezzled my father’s life savings,” he said.

“I mostly work as a porter these days. I carry all kinds of loads and these days I am mostly carrying LPG gas [cylinders],” adding that he does not have consistent work.

“I earn around 500 (taka) per day ($4) and there is no set earning. When there is little work, I hardly make 200-300,” says Basent.

He eats in budget-friendly restaurants rather than cooking himself because the cost of essentials has soared in recent months.

“I haven’t been able to send much to my family. Luckily for me, a nonprofit is paying for my daughter’s education. My father manages his money from his elderly allowance,” he said. “I use whatever I save to buy clothes, gifts for my daughter and help my family however I can.”

Reporting from Noida, India, by Yashraj Sharma; from Dhaka, Bangladesh, by Moudud Sajan and from Kathmandu, Nepal, by Samik Kharel