Labour right activists on Saturday demanded immediate approval of the draft Domestic Worker Protection and Welfare Policy prepared in 2010 to ensure the rights of domestic workers.
At a seminar, they urged the government to ratify ILO Convention 189 on Decent Work for Domestic Workers and to enact law and frame policies in accordance with the convention.
Bangladesh Labour Rights Forum and Campaign for Right to Food and Social Security jointly organised the seminar at Dhaka Reporters Unity.
Researcher ASM Sadikur Rahman presented a paper on ‘present status of domestic worker of Bangladesh and legal initiatives to ensure their rights’, saying that domestic workers were yet to be recognised as labour and there was no law or policy to protect their rights.
Domestic workers are victims of torture, rape, murder and different other violence as there is no legal registration for them, he said.
He said that according to Bangladesh Institute of Labour Studies statistics, at last 799 domestic workers were tortured in the last 10 years.
BILS statistics showed that 39 domestic workers were tortured across the country including 26 in the capital between January 1 and November 30 this year.
Referring to Baseline Survey 2007 conducted by ILO and UNICEF, Sadikur said that there were 420,000 domestic workers in the country including 147,000 in Dhaka.
Addressing the seminar Jatiya Sramik Jote President Shirin Akhter called on people to raise their voice for immediate approval of the draft Domestic Worker Protection and Welfare Policy to ensure the rights of domestic workers.
She stressed the implementation of 10-point directives issued by the High Court in February 2010.
Bangladesh Institute of Labour Studies assistant executive director Syed Sultan Uddin Ahmed said that domestic workers were still out of legal coverage for which children were being deprived of education as major portion of the domestic workers were children.
Bangladesh Labour Rights Forum convener Abul Hossain, Mawlana Bhashani Science and Technology University professor Muhammad Omar Faruk, Textile-Garments Workers Unions Federation president Lavli Yeasmin, Jatiya Garhasthya Nari Sramik Union general secretary Murshida Akhter and Campaign for Right to Food and Social Security coordinator Manobendra Dev also spoke at the seminar.
-With New Age input
