Thousands of migrant workers have died since Qatar was awarded to host the 2022 FIFA World Cup.

On November 18, 2019, Latha Bollapally received a call from Qatar. Her husband had had a heart attack the night before in his room. Ten days after his death, the body arrived at the village. He worked abroad for 12 years. - He never said anything about his salary or about the working conditions or how he lived. When he died, we received one thousand Indian rupees as compensation, says Brother Rajesh. The family knows very little about his life in Qatar. - He lived alone, cooked all his food by himself and when some relatives wanted to make contact with him, he distanced himself from them.

In February 2020, Farzana Akhter lost her husband and gave birth to their first daughter. Instead of celebrating a new life, she had to go to the airport and claim Zobair Ahmed’s dead body along with $410 and a death certificate. He was 32 and had worked as a driver in Qatar for nine years. The official cause of death said “strangulation”. It was unclear if he had committed suicide or accidentally ended up hanging in his helmet strap. “I refuse to believe that he would have taken his own life,” the widow says. “I see no reason why.”

On May 15, 2020, migrant Shohag Madbar died at his room at the age of 30. The death certificate from the Qatari government mentiones the cause of death as a “heart attack”. Due to the uncertain job situation and the irregular wage, Shohag lived with a constant tension. The family believes the pressure caused a “mental shock”. When asked, Shohag’s uncle Md Kamal Uddin said that the family had been struggling since his death. – Shohag’s father who is a farmer his mother and their two daughters lost all dreams when they sent their only young breadearner to Qatar.

Mohammed Suman Miah from Bangladesh died in Qatar on April 29, 2020 at the age of 34. The death certificate from the authorities states that he died of heart failure as a result of natural causes, but nothing about what these causes are. The family had borrowed $ 7,000 for the visa. Eventually, he got a job at a construction site. The temperature when he died was about 38 degrees Celsius in the shade. Suman's colleagues told his family that he died towards the end of the shift from a heart attack and that he was taken to the hospital but that his life could not be saved.

In May 2020, Delowar Hossaini's body returned to the capital Dhaka. When he suffered a stroke, he was taken to a hospital, but his life could not be saved. The family says it was his second stroke since he started working on the irrigated farm. - After the first one, he traveled home for a while to recharge, says the widow Nasrin Akhter. The family received compensation from the company and the government in Bangladesh. With that money, the family became debt free. As soon as her two sons, who are now in high school, have graduated, they both plan to travel to Qatar.

Mosharaf Hossen decided to migrate to Qatar to fulfill his dream of lifting his family out of poverty. For five years he worked as a mason at different construction sites but newer got payed on a regular basis. “The sudden and untimely death put us, a five-member family in dire hardship and debt bondage,” says Mosharaf’s widow Josna Begum. Her husband died on August 8, 2018 at the age of 38. The official cause of death was “cardiac chock” according to his death certificate.