TOBA TEK SINGH, Oct 21: Scores of brick kiln workers and Labour Qaumi Movement (LQM) activists staged a rally on Monday in protest at kiln owners’ refusal to pay government’s fixed wages of Rs740 per 1,000 bricks to the workers.

Protesters sat down at Shahbaz Sharif Chowk for more than one hour disrupting traffic. Later, they arrived at the District Government Complex but were barred by police from entering the complex premises.

LQM leader Alya Bano, Asghar Jat, Tanweer Chaudhry, Muhammad Shabbir, Malik Abdul Majeed and Baba Abdul Latif addressed the protesters.

Speakers said the district administration had failed to resolve disputes between workers and kiln owners while the Social Welfare Department had not registered kilns and social security cards were also not issued to the workers.

They warned that if their matter was not redressed they would go on strike and take out rallies in all towns of the district every day.

District Coordination Officer Dr Farah Masood met a three-member delegation of the protesters and assured them that a meeting of representatives of kiln owners, workers and officials of social security department would be arranged on Tuesday (today) in her office over which they ended their protest.