Absence of day care centres at workplace and the denial of maternity leave are creating an acute problem for millions of working women in Bangladesh.
Working women with small children said that both the public as well the private sector employers flout the labour law which requires setting up of day care facilities at any workplace employing 40 or more women.
For millions of women working at apparel factories the problem is all the more serious as they often do not get maternity leave and other facilities the labour law stipulates.
They said that their children grow up at home without getting the needed care or protection.
They called it totally regrettable that a society could ignore the need for daycare centres at a time when the concept of working parents and nuclear families was catching on.
Rights groups said that the factories and the offices violate the law of the land with impunity as there is none to enforce the provisions in the statute.
They said that Section 94 of Bangladesh Labour Act 2006, stipulates that a workplace that has at least 40 women employees, not necessarily working mothers, must have childcare facilities for the children aged up to six years.
Saima and Nipa, said that working mothers had to leave their children at home uncared for as the apparel factory they work for, Island Fashion, does not have a day care centre.
Seeking anonymity, a private telephone company employee, said that the employers did not allow six months’ maternity leave to expecting mothers working there.
The company also does not have a day care centre for the children of working mothers, they said.
Under the recently amended Rule 197(1) of Part-I of the Bangladesh Service Rules, notified by the finance ministry in the official gazette, women government servants are entitled to six months’ maternity leave during their service career from January 9.
Before the rule was amended they were entitled to four months’ maternity leave.
But the rule is not applicable for women employed by the private sector.
National Garment Workers’ Federation president Amirul Haque Amin said as 60 to 70 per cent of the apparel factories did not allow maternity leave forcing women workers to leave their job before delivery.
The remaining factories allow maternity leave but not fully as the labour law requires, Amin said.
He said that the owners always showed fake child rooms at apparel factories to mislead the buyers.
He said that about 30 per cent of the factories in Dhaka which have children’s rooms never serve the children because they were created to impress the buyers.
Mohammad Habib, owner of Imperial Knitting Industry at Mahakhali said only five to 10 per cent apparel factories in the city had children’s rooms.
‘If I want to deceive you I could show you a fake room for children like several other apparel factories,’ he said.
However, Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association president Abdus Salam Murshidi claimed that around 70 per cent of the apparel factories in the city had children’s rooms.
He said that as the other factories lacked enough space, they were trying to relocate outside city.
The factories established in the 1980s in the city have no rooms for children as there was no plan for this facility at that time, he said.
He said that his own factory, which employs 160 women workers, has no child room because it’s a small factory.
Clinical scientist SK Roy told New Age that it was always advisable to keep a child as close to the mother as possible.
World Health Organisation calls for exclusive breastfeeding which mean the baby ought to have nothing but breast milk up to six months from birth.
WHO prohibits even giving water to the baby during the firs six months of its life.
‘Breastfeeding is absolutely essential for physical and mental development of a baby,’ said S K Roy, senior scientist at the clinical science division of International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, Bangladesh.
He said that it was through breastfeeding that attachment grows between a mother and a baby.
If a child grows uncared for it could be peevish, he said.
At the same time, he said, as no mother can concentrate at work if she leaves her baby at home, it is bound to affect the factory productivity.
Shirin Sharmin Choudhury, state minister for women and children affairs told New Age that the government cannot force private companies to allow six months’ maternity leave to their employees.
She said that the employees could lodge complaints against the erring factories or companies also not providing the daycare centres.
But there is no mechanism for monitoring or forcing the companies to follow the law, she said.
Working women said that 24 day care centres run by the ministry for women and children affairs across the country, as totally inadequate to meet the needs.
The ministry runs 19 day-care centres in Dhaka division and 13 of them for low-income groups, and six for middle-income groups, said ‘Day Care’ project officials.
A daycare centre has the maximum capacity to care for 80 children.
Pixy Naznin, deputy director of the project told New Age that 14 day care centres which were shut down in July 2008 would be reopened and soon.
She said that earlier the centres were run under development budget and now onwards they would be run under revenue budget.
The centres remain open from 8.30 AM to 5.30 PM.
Courtesy of New Age
