When Pawan Kumari’s husband called one morning from Kuwait, where he had gone to work nine months earlier, there was no reason to worry. They would call each other two or three times a day and talk about how, if he could earn enough money, they would send their boys to a good school and pay off their debts.
On that day in January she was busy washing clothes, so her husband, Rajiv Kumar Ray, spoke to their two young sons instead. But when Pawan called him back, he didn’t pick up.
