THIS is with reference to the column ‘From The Past Pages of Dawn’ (Feb 9) through which I came to know that the first Pakistan Tripartite Labour Conference was held in Karachi on Feb 8, 1949.

Speaking on the occasion, Nawabzada Liaquat Ali Khan, the country’s first prime minister, as quoted in the report, said: “The first and foremost duty of my government is to end all exploitation of one group of people by another.”

The prime minister also assured the labourers and peasants “a rosy dawn and a bright morning”, provided they collaborated “sincerely” in this regard.

Over the last 75 years since the promise was made, the workers in all fields of business, industrial, agricultural and other fields of economic activity have sincerely delivered their very best to achieve their respective employers’ targets. Still, they have never woken up to the promised rosy dawn and bright morning. The exploitation of labour class by the employers has continued, and continues, unabated.

The minimum wage of Rs32,000 per month is not good enough for even an individual to survive with dignity. To manage a family in that budget is unimaginable. The plight of the majority of workers is even worse as they do not get even the designated minimum wage. Sanitary workers and security guards are paid monthly wages that are much less than that. The latter are required to perform 12-hour shifts every day, seven days a week.

Third party contractors and service providers do pay monthly contributions on behalf of their employees to the Employees’ Old-Age Benefits Institution (EOBI) and the Employees’ Social Security Institution. They get the cost of these contributions reimbursed by the principal employers, but do not obtain registration cards from the two insti- tutions that are supposed to be handed over to their employees.

This tactic enables them to manipulate the number of actual employees for whom contributions under both the schemes are payable. Consequently, these unfortunate employees neither get medical treatment from the dispensaries run by the Employees’ Social Security Institution, nor will be eligible to receive pension from EOBI on their retirement from service.

Government inspectors prefer to look the other way for a variety of obvious and well-known reasons. Things being what they have been, and continue to be, the promise of “a rosy dawn and a bright morning” has remained just that; a promise. The eternal wait continues.

Parvez Rahim
Karachi

Published in Dawn, February 17th, 2024