Gulf rupee: When the Reserve Bank of India played central banker in West Asia

 Even after Indian independence, the rupee was the legal tender in a few Persian Gulf states. It was replaced with the Gulf rupee in 1959 to curb gold smuggling.

When an Indian traveller wanted to visit certain Persian Gulf sheikhdoms in the 1950s, there was no need to stock up on foreign currency before the journey since the Indian rupee was the legal tender in these countries. For almost all financial transactions, the United Arab Emirates (then known as the Trucial States), Kuwait, Bahrain, Oman and Qatar used the rupee. The system was put in place by the British when they ruled India. But the arrangement suited the Reserve Bank of India as well, as the Gulf countries would purchase the rupees with pound sterling, against which the Indian currency was pegged.

By virtue of the system, India had economic clout in the Persian Gulf states that were still British protectorates and years away from a major oil boom. However, smugglers and other criminals saw it as an opportunity to make money from the average Indian’s desire to hoard gold.

Indranil Mukherjee/AFP

The modus operandi was quite simple. Smugglers would send young men to the Gulf on ostensible business trips with wads of rupee notes. There, gold would be purchased with the smuggled rupees and brought back to India. This would inevitably create an excess of Indian currency in the Gulf, leading to the extra rupees being sold back to the RBI, which lost valuable foreign exchange.

As is the case now, gold smugglers were very innovative in their methods to bypass Indian Customs officials. A well-known and often-repeated anecdote among the first generation of Malayali migrant workers in the Gulf tells the story of a man who was asked by an acquaintance to take a clock back to Bombay from a Gulf country. The unsuspecting young man carried the clock, inside which gold biscuits were neatly hidden, and was arrested and prosecuted in India.

“While the smuggling had been a problem for many years, in 1957 and 1958 the problem rose to alarming proportions and took a large toll on India’s reserves of foreign exchange,” Peter Symes, an Australian researcher and expert on paper money, wrote in a 1999 article.

A New York Times report from April 1959 stated that India had to pay the equivalent of $92.4 million in sterling for rupees presented through traders and banks in the Persian Gulf in 1957 alone. The report estimated that $69.3 million went to the region from India in exchange for smuggled gold in the first nine months of 1957.

Launch of the Gulf rupee

By 1959, India faced a major foreign exchange crisis thanks to the thriving gold smuggling business, losing hundreds of millions in sterling.

“To obviate or at least mitigate malpractices, which such an arrangement could give rise to, a separate series of notes exclusively for circulation in the Gulf (Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, and the Trucial States) were issued by the Indian Government and the Reserve Bank of India in the 1950s,” according to the RBI.

On May 1, 1959, Indian President Rajendra Prasad gave his assent for the Reserve Bank of India (Amendment) Act 1959, after it was passed by both houses of the Parliament. The law allowed the Indian government and RBI to issue special notes that were intended to be circulated only in the Gulf region. This currency, which had the same value as the Indian rupee, was known as the Gulf rupee or External rupee.

One Gulf Rupee. Wikimedia Commons [CC0 1.0]

“The Ministry of Finance drew up the reform after months of secret consultations and after obtaining the approval of the British Government, the Bank of England and the rulers of the sheikhdoms,” the New York Times reported after the Lok Sabha passed the bill.

Shrouded in secrecy, as was the case with the 2016 demonetisation in India, few members of the ruling party knew that this reform was being planned. The task was entrusted to Morarji Desai, then the minister of finance. The bill was introduced in the Lok Sabha on April 27, 1959.

“The introduction of the amendment to the Reserve Bank of India Act, to the Indian parliament, caused some consternation to the members of parliament, as it was proposed without any warning,” Symes wrote. “The Government of India had tried to introduce the amendment with a degree of haste so that they could reduce the window of opportunity for people who might take advantage of the proposed issue of special notes and increase the smuggling activity in the immediate future. However, following a delay of a day or so in which the opposition was allowed to review the measures, the amendment to the Act was passed with little difficulty.”

The Gulf rupee notes retained the contemporary design but were different in colour and carried the prefix “Z”. The notes were issued one, ten and hundred denominations and were redeemable only at the Bombay office of issue.

Holders of regular Indian currency notes in the Gulf were given six weeks to exchange them for the new currency or sterling. The transition to the new notes was fairly smooth and regular rupee notes were no longer accepted in the Gulf. Innovative gold smugglers, however, found other ways to satiate the Indian appetite for the precious metal. At the time of the passing of the bill, Indians were believed to be privately hoarding up to $2 billion in gold.

Haj notes

Indian pilgrims also took rupee notes when they went on the Haj pilgrimage, where they could freely exchange them for Saudi riyals. The Indian government had initially allowed Saudi banks and traders to exchange these rupees for sterling in Bombay, but fears persisted over smugglers using this route to buy foreign exchange.

In response to this threat, the Indian government began to issue special Haj rupee notes for pilgrims going to Mecca and Medina. The notes in ten and hundred denomination had the word HAJ inscribed on the obverse. Another way to distinguish them from normal rupee notes was the serial number that was prefixed with the letters “HA”.

The Haj rupee was exchanged at par to the Saudi riyal in the early 1960s. (A Saudi riyal is now worth almost 20 rupees.) Haji Siddique Mohammed, a 79-year old retired railway employee from Mangalore, remembers using the Haj rupee during a pilgrimage in 1963. “We got the Haj rupee from the Haj Committee of India, before boarding the ship for Jeddah,” Mohammed told this writer. “I managed to preserve a couple of notes, but they were unfortunately lost when I moved out of my official quarters after retirement.”

Devaluation of the rupee

The special notes for the Haj and the Gulf stayed in circulation until the mid-1960s but were slowly being phased out in some countries. This was at a time when Indian economic growth was slow, and the Gulf nations were in the early stages of a boom. Kuwait introduced its own currency as early as 1961 and a few years later, Bahrain followed suit.

The end of the Gulf rupee was, however, precipitated by an important development in India. In June 1966, Indian Finance Minister Sachindra Chaudhuri, with the blessings of Indira Gandhi, announced a devaluation of the rupee. Overnight the exchange rate of the dollar rose to Rs 7.5 from Rs 4.76. Although this decision surprised many, rumours were doing the rounds for several months.

A World Bank team that had visited India in 1965 proposed the idea of devaluation of the rupee to get the economy moving. Media reports of the time suggested that devaluation was one of the West’s preconditions for increasing aid for India’s fourth five-year plan. The decision prompted members of the opposition and the business community to accuse the government of bowing to pressure from the United States and multilateral lending institutions.

The devaluation created a stir in West Asia, with some rulers asking the British government to intervene, since the original arrangement to rely on the Indian rupee was put in place by the British. Such requests were turned down.

Qatar and Dubai withdrew the Gulf rupee from circulation within months of the devaluation of the Indian rupee, with both states temporarily using Saudi riyals. They would subsequently use Qatar and Dubai riyals, which had the same value of the pre-devaluation Indian rupee. Most of the Trucial States followed suit, but Abu Dhabi decided to use the Bahraini dinar, which had an exchange rate of 10 Gulf rupees.

A bank in Al Ain, southeast of Dubai. Dubai withdrew the Gulf rupee from circulation within months of the devaluation of the Indian rupee in 1966. Credit: WAM/AFP

“Consequently, following the introduction of the Qatar and Dubai riyal, the Qatar and Dubai Currency Board made a claim to the Reserve Bank of India for the total amount of sterling originally sent to cover the rupees held by Qatar and Dubai, and not the lesser value of what the Gulf rupees were actually worth,” Symes wrote.

The RBI would deal with each of the Gulf states separately when it came to the settlement of the sterling reserves that it held.

The RBI-issued currency survived in Oman until 1970 and was mostly accepted as legal tender only in the country’s ports. In May 1970, the Saidi rial (named in honour of the House of Al Said) was introduced as a currency in Oman and replaced the Gulf rupee. The new currency was exchanged at par with the sterling. Gulf rupees were exchanged for 21 rupees to the riyal and were redeemed in Bombay by the Omani government. The country’s present currency the Omani rial became the legal tender in 1972.

The Haj and Gulf rupee notes were withdrawn by the RBI in the early 1970s and are now a much-sought after collector’s item. Auctions conducted by Spink & Son have managed to get bids from 120 pounds and VAT for a 10 Gulf rupee note to 44,000 pounds for a 100 Haj rupee note. Collectors and enthusiasts warn of several fake notes being sold for high prices on different e-commerce websites.

Five decades after the Gulf and Haj rupees have ceased to exist, India continues to enjoy strong business and cultural links with Persian Gulf states but the idea of the country getting back the economic clout that newly-independent India enjoyed in West Asia does not look realistic.

Ajay Kamalakaran is a writer and independent journalist, based in Mumbai. He is a Kalpalata Fellow for History & Heritage Writings for 2021.

(Source: Scroll)

Cruise ship service from Qatar to Oman and Kuwait soon

Minister of Transport and Communications H E Jassim bin Saif Al Sulaiti toured the ship, which is currently docked at Doha Port. 
From Doha to Oman, the cruise ship is expected to take around 20-25 hours and same time to return to Doha Port. 
The France-made ship has 237 rooms and boasts of many facilities like cinema hall, meeting rooms, restaurants, cafes, and medical facilities like doctors and nurses.

The 145 metre-long cruise ship ‘Grand Ferry’ docked at Doha Port. The cruise ship can carry 870 persons and 670 cars. All pictures: Abdul Basit / The Peninsula

Residents will be able to go to Oman and Kuwait on cruise ship with their cars soon. A luxury cruise ship, which is a first-of-its-kind service in the Gulf region, is expected to start its service in two weeks to Oman and Kuwait.

The 145 meter-long cruise ship ‘Grand Ferry’ has the capacity to carry 870 persons and 670 cars.

Minister of Transport and Communications H E Jassim bin Saif Al Sulaiti toured the ship, which is currently docked at Doha Port.

“We want to contribute to strengthening the relationship between the countries by carrying more people. It has not been used in the Gulf before and it is the first time for the region,” Faisal Mohamed Al Sulaiti, owner of the ship told The Peninsula.

“We are the pioneer in this type of business and we are sure it will be successful because there is a huge demand for this kind of service,” he added.

Initially, the ship will be going to ports in Oman and Kuwait, but the service can be extended to Iran, if there is enough demand for the route.

“After the blockade, a lot of passengers have the limitation of driving through the borders to neighbouring countries. So we are giving people the flexibility to go with their own cars. They can disembark in Oman or Kuwait and they can drive around,” said Faisal Mohamed Al Sulaiti.

The France-made ship has 237 rooms and boasts of many facilities like a cinema hall, meeting rooms, restaurants, cafes, and medical facilities such as doctors and nurses. In case of any emergency, there is a facility for helicopter landing in the ship.

The Minister of Transport and Communications, H E Jassim bin Saif Al Sulaiti (right), with the owner of MV Grand Ferry cruise ship, Faisal Mohamed Al Sualiti (centre), and Manolis Moutsatso (left), Captian of the ship, during a tour of the Grand Ferry ship at Doha Port yesterday. 

From Doha to Oman, the cruise ship is expected to take around 20- 25 hours and same time to return to Doha port.

Apart from passengers, the ship will also playing a major role in cargo movement.

“We expect this service to be very successful. We will also be carrying the cargo in order to balance the revenue,” he said. Transporting of cargo will mean additional revenue for the ship.

The details about fares have not been finalised yet and will be announced soon, he added.

The management of ship is in talks with authorities in Oman and Kuwait to ease visa requirements for expatriates in Qatar, so that they can also take a trip to these countries.

Travel agents will handle the reservations for passengers and cars while cargo booking will be done by forwarding and shipping agents. “We have a good capacity in order to carry passengers, cars, trucks and heavy trucks. We have a good facility inside the ship for our guests,” said Manolis Moutsatsos, Captain of the cruise ship.

(Source: The Peninsula)

Kerala man loses job in Oman for poking fun at plight of flood victims

"This is to inform that we have terminated your service with immediate effect because of your highly insensitive and derogatory comments on social media with regard to current flood situation in Kerala, India," read the termination letter.

A Kerala man working in Oman was fired by his employer after he allegedly posted insensitive comments about flood-affected victims in his home state, Khaleej Times reported.

Rahul Cheru Palayattu, an employee of Lulu Group International, allegedly poked fun at the sanitary needs of the flood victims while replying to a Facebook post by volunteers appealing for help.

“This is to inform that we have terminated your service with immediate effect because of your highly insensitive and derogatory comments on social media with regard to current flood situation in Kerala, India,” read his termination letter signed by Lulu’s HR manager in Oman.

Palayattu publicly apologised for his comments after facing severe backlash on Facebook. “I am really sorry for what I did. I was in an inebriated state when I posted that message. At that time I did not know what I did was a grave mistake,” he said in a video message posted on Facebook.

After facing the heat for his remarks, Rahul Cheru Palayattu apologised by posting a video on Facebook on Sunday, “I am really sorry for what I did. I was in an inebriated state when I posted that message. At that time I did not know what I did was a grave mistake.”

V, Nandakumar, CCO of LuLu Group told Khaleej Times, the organization “took immediate steps to terminate his services and send out a very loud and clear message to the society about our stance in such issues.”

“We as an organization have always stood for humanitarian values and highest ethical practices,” he added.

Lulu Group’s founder and managing director, Yousuf Ali, who also hails from Kerala, has so far donated 9.23 million dirhams towards relief and rehabilitation work in Kerala.

Extending their support to the people affected by flash floods in Kerala, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) government on Saturday formed a committee to provide relief to the southern state.

Kerala has been facing its worst flooding in a century, with nearly 400 people being killed. The state has suffered a loss of Rs. 19,512 crore due to the deluge, Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan said on Saturday.

As the massive floods, caused due to torrential rains wreaked havoc, besides the Central Government, the Chief Ministers of various states have come forward to support Kerala and offered financial aid to the southern state.

(Source: The Indian Express)

Unesco announces new heritage sites around the world

Mountain monasteries in South Korea, a Saudi oasis and Mumbai's art deco buildings are among a number of sites to make it on to Unesco's World Heritage List.

Being listed gives them legal protection under international treaties.

The UN's cultural organisation, meeting in Bahrain, have been agreeing which landmark sites around the world need preserving for their cultural, historic or scientific significance.

Here are some of the chosen sites:

Ancient port city: Qalhat, Oman

Bibi Maryam Mausoleum in Qalhat, Oman

In the east of Oman, the walled city of Qalhat was a bustling port in the 11th and 15th Centuries.

It is a "unique archaeological testimony" to the links between the east of Arabia and the rest of the world, says Unesco.

Hidden Christian sites: Nagasaki, Japan

Nokubi Church, Nagasaki

The site on Kyushu island consists of 10 villages, a castle and a cathedral and were built between the 18th and 19th Centuries, at a time when the Christian faith was banned in Japan.

They reflect the earliest activities of Christian missionaries and settlers in Japan, and "bear unique testimony to a cultural tradition nurtured by hidden Christians", Unesco says.

Gothic and Art Deco architecture: Mumbai, India

Art deco buildings adorn Mumbai's Marine Drive

Having become a global trading hub in the late 19th century, Mumbai embarked on an ambitious urban planning project, constructing beautiful buildings for residential and commercial use.

The Victorian buildings are more classical constructions with balconies and verandas, while the Art Deco buildings are cinemas, flats and hospitals in an array of colours.

"These two ensembles bear testimony to the phases of modernization that Mumbai has undergone in the course of the 19th and 20th centuries," Unesco says.

Evolving cultural oasis: Al-Ahsa, Saudi Arabia

Al-Ahsa boasts more than two million palm trees

Al-Ahsa, in the eastern Arabian peninsula, is the largest oasis in the world and has been home to humans from the Neolithic era to the present day.

It also boasts 2.5 million date palms, gardens, canals, springs, wells, a drainage lake, historical buildings and archaeological sites.

Unesco called it "an exceptional example of human interaction with the environment".

Mountain monasteries: South Korea

Magoksa temple in Gonju is one of the seven ancient temples

The Sansa mountain monasteries in the south of South Korea have been operating as centres of faith since the 7th Century.

The seven temples contain open courtyards with lecture halls, pavilions and ornate Buddha halls.

Unesco called them "sacred places, which have survived as living centres of faith and daily religious practice to the present".

Sassanid archaeological landscape: Iran's Fars region

Qal'eh Dokhtar castle in Fars

The mix of fortified structures, palaces, and city plans - at eight archaeological sites across Fars province - date back to the era of the Sassanian Empire, from the 3rd to 5th Centuries.

The sites not only reflect the "optimised utilisation of natural topography", but also bear witness to the influence of Roman art and the Achaemenid and Parthian cultural traditions, Unesco says.

Dry-walled settlement: Kenya

An entrance at the Thimlich Ohinga dry-stone wall settlement

The Thimlich Ohinga is the largest and best preserved dry-stone wall settlement, typical of Kenya's Lake Victoria region.

The settlement, situated north-west of Migori town, is thought to have been built in the 16th Century and appears to have served as a fort for communities and livestock.

Unesco called it "an exceptional example of the tradition of the first pastoral communities in the Lake Victoria Basin".

Photos courtesy of Unesco

(Source: BBC)

Oman cyclone brings three years' rainfall in single day, leaves 11 dead

A cyclone more powerful than any previously recorded in southern Oman has slammed into the Gulf country and neighbouring Yemen, deluging a major city with nearly three years' worth of rainfall in a single day and leaving 11 people dead.

Eight people were also missing as Cyclone Mekunu caused flash flooding that tore away whole roadways and submerged others in Salalah, Oman's third-largest city, stranding drivers.


Rushing waters from the rain and storm surges flooded typically dry creek beds.

The holiday destination's now-empty tourist beaches were littered with debris and foam from the churning Arabian Sea.

India's Meteorological Department said the storm packed maximum sustained winds of 170 to 180 kilometres per hour with gusts of up to 200kph.

It called the cyclone "extremely severe".

Branches and leaves littered the streets. Several underpasses became standing lakes and cars were left abandoned on the road.

The Port of Salalah — a key gateway for the country and for Qatar amid a regional diplomatic dispute — remained closed, its cranes secured against the pounding rain and winds.

Salalah Port Services said it would take a minimum of 72 hours to "make the port safe".

Omani forecasters said Salalah and the surrounding area would get at least 200 millimetres of rain, over twice the city's annual downfall.

It actually received 278.2mm, nearly three times its annual rainfall.

The country's Labour Ministry declared a three-day holiday for companies and establishments in the private sector in the Dhofar region, state news agency ONA reported.

The central bank, meanwhile, issued a circular announcing a three-day holiday starting on Sunday for money exchange houses, banks, finance and leasing companies in Dhofar.

(Source: ABC)

Deception, lies and trafficking: How a 77-yr-old Omani Sheikh married a teenager in Hyderabad

The teenager was sold for Rs 5 lakh, the case has exposed the elaborate trafficking network.

Houses converted to illegal lodges. A web of brokers to procure certificates, clothes, passports and air tickets. And a qazi to perform the wedding. That's the laundry list of players who get together and run the elaborate trafficking racket in Hyderabad.

It has been three months since Fathima*, a resident of Nawab Saheb Kunta in Hyderabad, has seen her 16-year-old daughter.

"I don't want to talk to anyone. I just want my daughter back," she says in between sobs.

The Hyderabad police on Friday arrested two men who performed the marriage of Fathima's minor daughter, with a 77-year-old Omani national.

According to the police, the Omani national, identified as Ahmed, married the 16-year-old in May at a guest house in Jalpally.

He returned home after the marriage and sent a visa for the girl, who later joined him in Muscat.

The case
The case had come to light earlier this week, after Fathima approached the Falaknuma police station, alleging that her husband's sister, Ghousia Begum, and brother-in-law, Sikander, 'sold' the girl to the Omani man for Rs 5 lakh.

"My husband works as a daily wage labourer in a marriage hall. When Ghousia and Sikander approached me with a marriage proposal for my minor daughter, I rejected it then and there," the complaint states.

"Without my knowledge, the duo approached my daughter and lured her by showing her photos and videos of the lavish Gulf lifestyle. In spite of my objection, my daughter was married off to the sheikh," she wrote.

Though the complaint stated that the man was 65 years old, police have found that he is in fact 77 years old.

The police also said that the girl informed her parents over the phone that the Sheikh was mentally and physically torturing her.

"She wants to return to Hyderabad. When I insisted that they return my daughter to me, Sikander offered a phone and cooler to my husband and asked him not to pursue the case. I spoke directly to the Omani national, who said that he had 'purchased' my daughter for Rs 5 lakh," the mother says.

The parents say Ahmed agreed to send their daughter back, only if he was repaid.

The police have registered a case of cheating and criminal intimidation against the Omani, the girl's father, his sister, her husband, the qazi and others.

"The qazi who performed the marriage is also under surveillance," said Deputy Commissioner of Police V. Satyanarayana. The qazi could not be formally arrested as he is recuperating from a bypass surgery.

A police officer said the girl's father may also be taken into custody for being lured by the money, and submitting a false affidavit showing her age as 21.

The larger problem
"The girl's parents are extremely poor, this makes them easy targets," says Amjed Ullah Khan, a local politician belonging to the Majlis Bachao Tehreek (MBT).

Amjed Ullah Khan with the girl's parents

Amjed says that there are several such 'agents', who facilitate the nikaah (marriage) of minor girls with old sheikhs and other foreign nationals.

"There are several houses in areas like Barkas and Chandrayangutta, where homes are illegally converted into 'lodges', to provide accommodation for these sheikhs, and even provide them with a change of clothes," Khan alleges.

Two photos of the sheikh that have emerged also strengthen Khan's claims, as one of them shows the Omani national in traditional attire, while the other photo shows him in a pant, shirt and a jacket.

"That's not all. They need a qazi to cooperate as well as a travel agent to book tickets to the foreign country. There are also other agents who duplicate Aadhaar cards, Electoral Photo Identity Card (EPIC), Passports etc. There is a large nexus involved," Amjed says.

"The nexus also involves politicians and local leaders who immediately rush to the police station when such agents are caught, and try to throw their weight around, and get the accused released," he adds.

"This is nothing short of human trafficking," says Achyuta Rao, a Hyderabad-based child rights activist with the Balala Hakkula Sangham, and former member of the State Commission for Protection of Child Rights (SCPCR).

"The government must take steps to curb this, by ensuring stringent action against those found indulging in such activities," he adds.

Achyuta suggests that security personnel at airports must be better trained to identify such cases.

"We pay so much attention to baggage at airports. If anything suspicious is found, we detain the passenger for hours, and do a thorough check. Why can't the same attention be paid to minors?" Achyuta asks.

"Authorities should be vigilant, and keep a lookout for any suspicious activity. They should ask anyone accompanying the child, to declare what their relationship is. If the documents claim that they are married, and the age difference is evident, then officials should detain them," he adds.

Additionally, Achyuta argues that airport authorities should accept government based certificates, over certificates issued by any religious body, irrespective of religion.

"The religious certificates are easier to fake, while the government certificates are more valid. We must take such factors into consideration," he says.

"Also, at the local level, qazis indulging in this should also be booked," Achyuta adds.

Amjed Ullah Khan also says that the police can put an end to this, only if there is political will.

"It is a very dangerous system that targets extremely poor families. There is an urgent need to break it, and agents should be punished severely," he adds.

Meanwhile, the police also said that they were making all efforts to bring the girl back to Hyderabad safely.

Union Minister for Women and Child Development Maneka Gandhi had on Thursday described the incident as "deeply disturbing", and urged External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj to intervene.

Authorities said they were keeping a close watch on 60 brokers who were identified during the investigation of such cases in recent years.

However, brokers based in Mumbai and even abroad are carrying on their activities by duping poor and illiterate families.

(Source: TNM)

Arab world's most common family names

Note: the results include expatriates of a country and not only its citizens.

What are some of the most common surnames in the region? The results will surprise you.

Forebears.com has a tool that reveals some of the most common surnames in each country. Take a look:

In Saudi Arabia, the most common surname is Khan.

Approximately 585,979 people in the kingdom bear the surname Khan, followed by Mohammed (200,931), Hussain (189,965) and Ahmad (157,297).

In Egypt, the most common surname is Mohamed.

Approximately 1,716,343 in the country bear this surname.

Mohamed is followed by Mahmoud (708,172), Ibrahim (656,180). Other family names in the top 10 include Gamal (624,004) and Mostafa (573,749).

Mohamed was followed by Abd, part of a conjugate family name, which cannot be fairly placed in the ranking.

In the UAE, the most common surname is Khan.

Approximately 137,035 people bear this family name, followed by Hussain (51,363), Nair (47,365) and Mohamed (41,059).

In Lebanon, the most common family name is Khoury.

Approximately 54,749 people in the country bear this family name, followed by Haddad (47,388).

Among the top 10 surnames in Lebanese is Aoun, with about 20,975 holding the last name.

The ranking lists 'Abou' as the most common surname but that's only because forbears.com doesn't register conjugate family names. So the #1 here actually goes to a cluster of a massive number of family names.

In Bahrain, the most common surname is Ali.

Approximately 15,549 people bear this family name in the country followed by Ahmed (12,459), Kumar (11,531) and Khan (10,211).

The most common family name in Jordan is Ahmad (43,803) followed by Haddad (39,703) and Saleh (34,062).

Among the top 10 surnames in the country include Hamdan (28,729) and Jaber (23,458).

Abu is listed as #1 only because forebears.com doesn't register conjugate family names (so Abu Hosn, for example, would be listed as Abu), so the ranking doesn't refer to a single family name but to at least 50.

The most common surname in Qatar is Mohammad.

Mohammad/Mohammed is listed twice because of differences in spelling, but we all know it's only an issue of transliteration. Add them together and Mohammed is the most common last name (22,169). Khan is second at 20,583.

Hussain (7,840) ranks third.

Khan is listed as No.1 in the ranking, but after combining the results of Mohammad/Mohammed -- the ranking differs.

The most common surname in Kuwait is Khan.

Approximately 21,753 people bear this surname in the country followed by Hussain (12,784), Mohamed (12,209) and Varghese (11,965).

The most common surname in Morocco is Alaoui.

Approximately 225,601 people bear this surname in the country followed by Alami (167,002) and Hassan (142,972).

Ait is listed as #1 only because forebears.com doesn't register conjugate family names, so the ranking doesn't refer to a single family name but to at least 50.

The most common surname in Oman is Khan.

Approximately 37,603 people bear this surname in the country followed by Al Balushi (34,911), Nair (23,676) and Oman (19,931).

(Source: Stepfeed)

Number of women drug addicts on the rise in Oman

An increasing number of women in Oman are falling prey to drugs, according to an expert from Ibn Sina Hospital, which has the country's only de-addiction facility.

Evidence based on patient visits to the facility shows that three to four new women addicts have sought medical attention here every month this year till September. Based on this, an unofficial projection for this year alone throws up a much higher number compared to the 31 women drug patients the Ministry of Health (MoH) has registered over six years from 2006 to 2011.

Acknowledging the trend, Dr Amira bint Abdul Mohsin al Raaidan, a psychiatrist at Ibn Sina Hospital, told Muscat Daily, “There has been a sharp increase in the number of women drug addicts the hospital receives. Not all are registered as patients and 30 to 40 per cent do not come back for follow-up treatment.”

The MoH data for 2006-11, which was provided by Dr Amira, also shows that all the 31 women addicts were in the 16-25 years age bracket and some were drug dealers themselves. The period recorded a total of 1,521 drug abuse cases.

According to Dr Amira, who is also the chairperson of Al Hayat Association, the only NGO working on drug awareness in Oman, and a member of the National Committee for Drugs and Psychotropic Substances, most of the women patients are either addicted to morphine or heroin.

She attributed the cause of addition to influence from peer groups, coercion, failed relationships, easy access to drugs and excess money. Many cases end in relapse due to lack of facilities.

“Some people in Oman are so rich that they don't know what to do with the excess money, and try drugs. I have had patients who are well educated, holding high posts and from good family

backgrounds. Some are drug dealers themselves.”

According to her, half a gramme of morphine costs RO10 while the same quantity of heroin costs RO50. “All the women patients I have handled use injections as the mode, for an instant high. Many of them also end up as HIV positive and Hepatitis C patients.”

Addiction can happen at any age, said Dr Amira. “For instance, an 18 year old girl dealt in drugs and confessed that she can't give up the habit. There was a case where a man forced his wife into taking drugs and later, they both turned into dealers.” She said that it has taken authorities some time to address the problem and added that people appear to be embarrassed to seek medical help in a conservative society such as that of Oman.

Rehabilitation facilities at the Ibn Sina hospital, too are limited, Dr Amira said. “It has just five beds for detoxification. I have more than 100 patients waiting to be treated. We take in patients, detoxify them and prescribe them a course of almost a month.” However, many of them go back to drugs, she said.

“I blame this on the lack of facilities. Oman had always been a timid nation and we did not regard this as an issue until now. It's a wake-up call for us.”

THE WARNING SIGNS

According to MoH figures, the period from 2006-11 registered 1,945 cases of alcohol and drug abuse (men and women) of which 1,521 were drug-related. The 1,945 cases included 1,155 singles, 692 married patients, 83 divorcees and five widows.

The most common mode of abuse was injections (1,009). The highest number of addicts (men and women) were registered in Muscat (1,149) followed by North Batinah (316).

Addicts can be identified from changes in behaviour and physical appearance. They may suffer weight loss, display violent behaviour, and have erratic sleeping patterns.

(Source: Muscatdaily.com)