08.09.2013 Hounded labour
Brick kiln workers see hope as Supreme Court fixes responsibility of their exploitation on DPOs
By Shahzada Irfan Ahmed
Ever wondered how it feels like trading in human slaves and making them work for you for peanuts, and a few morsels of food? Just talk to some contractor who manages workforce for brick kiln owners and buy these workers and families like cattle, to have an idea of the situation.
A surprise visit to a typical brick kiln would reveal that these people are under a different type of detention and cannot move from the place till they pay their outstanding debts. In many cases, these debts have been passed on to generations after generations, and the poor workers have no option but to pay back these amounts through deductions from their meager wages.
Though by law, owners cannot extend advances (peshgi) having value more than two-week wages of a brick kiln worker but unfortunately this practice goes on unabated. This peshgi system is the mother of all evils, says Safdar Mahar of Bonded Labour Liberation Front (BLLF), while talking to TNS. He says the poor brick kiln workers do not have access to any basic facilities and are highly underpaid. They have to take loans from the brick kiln owners whenever there is a financial emergency, health issues, injuries, illness, marriage or death in the family.
The owners are always waiting for such moments, he says, adding they waste no time in extending loans to them. This makes it is easy for them to retain their services as they know these people would never come out of the debt trap. Besides, they know the debt would keep on increasing over the time.
So, what then is the solution to this problem? The answer comes from the Supreme Court of Pakistan (SCP) which has strictly ordered Social Security Departments to register bonded labour and extend them due benefits under the concerned rules.
It all started with the habeas corpus complaint of a lady, Rasoolan Bibi, which she had filed in the court against a brick kiln owner. The court took immediate action and sent instructions to the Punjab Police Inspector General. These instructions were supposed to be circulated among all the law enforcement agencies and District Police Officers (DPOs). The court made it clear that in case a bonded labour incident is found or if a similar complaint of habeas corpus is received in future, the DPO concerned shall be held responsible for the violation.
To uproot peshgi system, the court has directed all the concerned departments to register all the labourers at brick kilns with the Social Security Department and given them a deadline of September 30 to return with positive results.
The social security card entitles its bearer to benefits like medical treatment, maternity care, death and disability grants, marriage and dowry grants, free education and so on. Once they have the social security by their side on all these occasions, they would never have to seek advances from the brick kiln owners, says Syeda Ghulam Fatima, secretary general of BLLF. She says the brick kiln owners should not worry about the nominal contribution they have to make to the Social Security Department. Even if they register the family heads, the dependents would automatically be covered, she adds.
Fatima and her team is aggressively pursuing the case and working on a project titled “Support Social Protection and Decent Work,” run jointly by his organisation, ActionAid and the European Union.
She tells TNS her team held many sessions with Sialkot DPO Muhammad Gohar Nafees and sensitised him about the grave human rights and labour laws violations at brick kilns. The DPO, she says, arranged a campaign through police and civil society organisations and discovered that 379 labourers were detained at brick kilns for not paying back the peshgis given to them, their parents or their forefathers.
The Sialkot police, under the command of DPO, got all these labourers released and registered about 150 cases against the brick kiln owners who had detained them and submitted their challans in courts.
A major problem, she says, is that the brick kiln owners do not get their employees registered for the reason that they want to avoid documentation of their businesses. Under the existing laws, workers can be registered only once their employers have confirmed they are working for them.
However, in this particular case the court has shifted the onus of eradicating bonded labour on the DPOs concerned. The situation across the province is that DPOs of different cities are running after Social Security Department officials, brick kiln owners and other stakeholders to meet the target of getting at least 15,000 social security cards issued to labourers by September 30, 2013.
The Bonded Labour System (Abolition) Act, 1992, talks about introduction of vigilance committees at local level so that they can identify cases of bonded labour in their vicinity. This is not possible in the absence of local government system, says Salman Abid, Punjab head of Strengthening Participatory Organisation. Local councilors can reach everybody in the area and knows such issues very well. “Therefore, my request to the government is to hold local government elections as early as possible. They can play a great role in different fields at the grassroots level.”
Punjab Employees’ Social Security Institution (PESSI) Director General Tariq Bajwa tells TNS they are going to register brick kiln workers at any cost. Though they can do that forcefully, they are negotiating with brick kiln owners and asking them to do that voluntarily. He adds this September is very important for the department as the deadline given by Supreme Court is about to end, and they are far from meeting the targets.
He tells TNS that the PESSI is taking steps to issue maximum number of social security cards to workers. Besides, he says, they have organised mobile teams which visit different places and register employees right there and then. They have also equipped their staff with cameras so that they can take pictures of labourers to be used later as evidence, he concludes. The PESSI is going to issue around 15000 social security cards to the brick kiln workers before September 30, 2013.
shahzada.irfan@gmail.com