IT will not be wrong to say that welfare of worker and labourer class has always been the cornerstone of Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) ideology. Sindh Government has once again proven it true by announcing on Saturday to launch Smart cards for registration of labourers and their family members in order to offer them different facilities including health coverage. Addressing a news conference, Provincial Labour Minister Saeed Ghani said the cards would be distributed amongst six hundred and thirty thousand workers across the province.
The scheme in fact was part of election manifesto of the PPP for 2008 general elections but it could not be implemented. Though belated yet Sindh government indeed deserves appreciation for fulfilling the commitment to protect rights of labourers. It must now be ensured that the scheme does not face any further delay and that it is executed in transparent manner without any discrimination. We will rather suggest that its scope should be further expanded and neglected home-based workers should also be made part of it. Factory owners also need to take their responsibilities and take steps that bring improvement in living standards of their workers. At present, workers are victims of exploitation and abuse. Their grievances include arbitrary dismissal, unclean working conditions, long working hours and salary below the statutory minimum wage.
Workers, many of them women, experience physical as well as verbal abuse, sometimes of sexual nature as well as forced overtime and denial of paid maternity leave. Labour departments in each of the four provinces are tasked with enforcing laws to monitor working conditions and have powers to initiate enforcement action. But to date, Pakistan’s labour inspection mechanism has wholly remained ineffectual and subject of numerous corruption allegations. Hence, focus of Sindh and provincial governments should also be towards ensuring compliance to labour laws and regulations. In fact strict action should be taken against companies and factories abusing the rights of workers. The labour laws should also be revisited in order to ensure these are in line with key international labour standards.
