Work in miserable environment
Staff Correspondent
Around 20 lakhs workers work in the city’s at least three thousand garment factories in harmful environment about 12 hours per day to earn livelihood. As a result they are being affected with various disease including jaundice, gastric, heart disease, reproductive health problem, sexual, ear and eye related diseases.
Workers have to take lunch standing or sitting on the floor of garment buildings as no dining facilities are available in most garments and non-availability of pure drinking water is another acute problem for them. That is why, workers drink polluted water regularly collected from bathrooms. Toilets at most garments are inadequate.
Besides, workers don’t enjoy leave facilities as per labor rules and especially female workers can not exercise their maternity leave facilities.
During a visit to different garments in the city including Lilik, Lopa, Amazon garment at Malibagh Chow-dhury para area and Azim and son at Farmgate, this correspondent found that workers had been working in a suffocating and injurious environment as most of the garments don’t have sufficient windows, toilet-rooms and arrangement of pure drinking water facilities for workers.
Talking to this correspondent, Rasheda Khatun, a worker of Lilik garment, said that owners of the readymade garments don’t consider them as human beings. “We worker don’t get maternity leave facilities let alone ordinary leave. We have to work all the time through pressure and putting up with different kinds of repression. Most of the time, we become bound to do over duty although we suffer from sickness but the payment for over time are not given to us properly,” she said, adding that her mother has been suffering from a serious disease as she also worked in the garment through insalubrious environment for two years. Expressing grave concern, she said “I will also be affected by unknown disease any time working in this unhealthy environment.”
A report conducted by Bangladesh Institute of Development Studies (BIDS) said 80 per cent garment workers work as nonpermanent employees and they don’t get appointment letter from the authority concerned. Besides, windows of rooms are totally closed in 27 per cent factories and arrangement of pure drinking water for workers are available in only 10 per cent factories. Around 54 per cent of total workers now engaged in garments were physically fit before joining here. The report also said 34 per cent workers are reluctant to continue their job due to various difficulties prevailing in this sector.
It may be mentioned that Nurunnahar, a worker of Padma Sweater garments at Mirpur area, didn’t get maternity leave despite her application at different times to the authority. When she fell in critical situation the authority gave her maternity leave. Her relatives took her to DMCH and she died there after the birth of a daughter, Nurunnahar’s relatives alleged.
Courtesy of www.thebangladeshtoday.com
