Garment workers' sad tale
SNM, On e-mail
Everyday in our community based Hospital I manage more than ten garment workers as a consultant. Mostly female, they are malnourished, short-statured, overworked and harbour various skin diseases. I talk with them, give them time and listen to their stories. Most of them have more than five brothers and sisters. They have to pay for the room rent, food, clothes, medicals, and many send money home to their sick or irresponsible parents who have only produced them without any responsibility. Parents expect them to work and send money home. These girls are bonded labourers of the garment owners as well as the parents. They try to save money for marriage and give dowry to the husband for the 'mercy' of marrying them. They are deceived at each point of life- by parents, owners and husbands. This is one part of the story. It is a country of cheap labour. One garment owner boasted 'so long cheap labour is there we need not worry'. Is the labour really cheap in Bangladesh? I doubt. Productivity of an average ill-health Bengali worker is around 60-70 percent of a worker of Vietnam or Cambodia or Pakistan or China. 'Garment' is a labour intensive industry. Our labour is cheap but they are not a quality labour force. There is no escape from this vicious cycle of poverty, ill health in the next few decades. However, with the rise of prices of essentials - even potato costs Tk.16 per kg, beef sells at Tk.150 per kg and so on-- the garment workers had no other alternative but to vandalise as the last resort to press forward their demands. They are driven to the walls by duel misrule- inability of the government to control market and insincerity of most of the owners. Our experience of trade unionism is not happy. The garment owners are within their rights to feel insecure about trade unions. Trade unions destroyed most of our nationalised sectors. They beat up officers, dictate terms, criminalise, extort and what not. Yet trade unions may be allowed with some strict conditions. Lastly, the owners should act quickly to save this thriving industry and also themselves. The owners may share profit with them or meet their demands on a priority basis.
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