Inferno in BSCIC enclave: One death is too many

Over the last 72 hours, damages to buildings, factories, shops and vehicles were countless. In a BBC interview, a spokesperson of the knitwear manufacturers' association blamed a vested group for trying to destroy the country's garment sector. Workers' representative, Ismail, however maintained that a few owners were hurting the industry's interests and workers were victimised. Politically, a motley alliance of 11 leftist parties expressed explicit support for the workers while the state machinery seemed to have backed the industry's owner from the outset.

The politics of the incident would have ended here if nothing flew beneath the surface. Hence, a number of theories should be tested to explain the mayhem and its genesis. The essential tips are: authorities' mishandling of the situation; conspiracy to stir trouble in the most promising sector of the economy (RMG); flaws in dispute settlement mechanism; and the machination of some to create instability to achieve partisan political goals.

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Apparently, mismanagement and flaws in dispute settlement seem to have sparked the inferno. The workers demanded payment of unpaid wage and overtime works. They also sought Eid bonus and few other privileges. They cited price hikes as reasons for seeking extra cash and bonuses.

The management refused to budge. The incident involved workers of two sister units only-- Pantex and Starlace -- from among a cluster of 250 such industrial outlets housed in the BSCIC village. The workers threatened to block goods moving out of the unit. The EPZ- like industrial village employs over 100,000 people and processes about 20 percent of the country's exports in conjunction with other BSCIC enclaves and EPZs.

Any disruption in the functioning of these sensitive units portends danger for the nation's economy and politics. These cluster of industries attracted nearly $638 million worth of foreign investment so far, and, according to the last count, fetched over 45 per cent of the country's export earnings during previous years.

Reports say the owner of the factory registered a complaint with local police as the unrest mounted in preceding days. That's fine. But the efforts of three magistrates and other district officials in the dispute settlement process seem to have backfired and further complicated the situation.

After all, the police would not have fired upon the crowd if the magistrates did not consent to it. Nor would they arrest the labour leader. Besides, negotiators from the executive organ of the state should have known the consequence of the owner not complying with workers' demands. And that's what had happened despite their interjection into the fray, in the dead of night.

What followed seemed like a replay of Murphy's Law: "If something can go wrong, it will." The final straw came when labour leader, Advocate Mahbubur Rahman Ismail, was implored over phone to join the dialogue by government officials, only to be arrested and taken to the thana prison after the negotiation hit a snag.

Such being the backdrop, it brings to the fore a moot issue relating to the quality of governance as was exhibited in this instance; jointly by the magistrates, police and other district officials. Despite licenses to operate BSCIC industrial outlets being contingent upon meeting specific criteria with respect to work hours, minimum wage and safety regulations, the management - worker relationship is not governed as yet by those uniform codes.

Then again, one observes the operatives of trade unions being vibrant in some industries while others deride such rights as 'ganging up' of workers against entrepreneurs. With respect to the wage, for which a worker sheds his sweat, the pay structure seems independent of the 'minimum wage' threshold that the ministry of labour was supposed to have imposed.

Labour unrest like this does occur due to the lack of regulatory mechanism crafted and modified from time to time through painful haggling among government representatives, entrepreneurs and labour leaders. In such tripartite agreement, standard hours of work are clearly defined, in sync with internationally accepted labour hours. Our industries are yet to follow such regulations scrupulously.

Moreover, overdue wage, if any, should have been paid up -- or deferred amicably -- by the management to avoid the situation from degenerating into something so tragic and painful. If the management failed to redress labour grievances pursuant to job contracts, the onus of a backlash would be deemed to have rested on the owner and management alone.

However, all this does not preclude the constitution of a judicial inquiry committee to unearth the truth. The investigation body must seek: (1) Whether the demands of the workers were legitimate under existing job contract (2) What led the owner to lodge a complaint with local police and what were alleged in specific terms? (3) How did the magistrates and district officials get involved in the negotiation process? (4) Who ordered the arrest of Ismail, the labour leader, and his incarceration inside Fatullah police station? (5) Based on minimum wage and the hours of work per day, did the owner owe money to the workers? (6) Were the workers right in claiming that their fundamental rights were infringed upon and violated by the management? (7) Did the police behave rationally and proportionally before indulging in a shooting spree?

And, to avoid the recurrence of similar incidents, executions of labour, wage and safety regulations must be a priority from now on. The workers deserve to be paid in time and in the amount prescribed. Barbarism reaches its height when bullets and brutality greet demands that are considered worth listening to. It might be one death, but it is too many in the context of the dispute.

Author and columnist M. Shahidul Islam is a Senior Assistant Editor of The Daily Star.