By; Fakhar Alam
PESHAWAR, May 2 (APP):: Busy like a honeybee in wheat harvesting, Rafique Khan (40), a poor labourer of Nowshera district was seen asking his co-workers to accelerate the work and complete it before sunset on Wednesday.
Unaware of the International Labour Day observed on May 1, in many countries including Pakistan with enthusiasm, the motivated labourer was assisted by his elder son Sadiq Khan and three others in wheat harvesting in his native village Dheri Ishaq at tehsil Pabbi.
Known as ‘Lala G’, Khan obtained a wheat harvesting project that included wheat cutting, threshing and storage of the commodity. He was working against the clock to complete it before the heavy rainfalls predicted by the Met Office for Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.
“I wake up early in the morning for cutting of standing wheat on five acres on paid contract i.e., per 200kg wheat or Rs8,000 per acre while its threshing has separate charges,” he told APP.
“Following the death of my father, Haji Muhammad Zaman, I discontinued my education after matric and started different labour jobs including wheat harvesting, fruits selling, transport and bricks kiln, besides opening a small general store at my village to meet the household, health and education expenses of my seven-member family in the wake of skyrocketing price hike,” said Rafique.
“I closed my small general store after it was severely damaged by the last year’s devastating floods in River Kabul and also sold my rickshaw to return all the loans obtained for my shop business,” he told with grief.
Enjoying tea under a Shisham tree with his fellow labourers before starting threshing of wheat in the afternoon, he said, “We prefer wheat harvesting these days due to high profit margin as compared to other labour jobs.”
“Purchasing of own tractor-thresher was my dream but could not materialize it due to financial constraints,” he added.
He urged the government to give interest-free loans to labourers so that they may establish their own businesses.
Like Rafique and Sadiq, hundreds of thousands of workers were engaged in different labour works including wheat harvesting, construction, transport, bricks kilns and tree plantations in KP and were contributing to the country’s development.
1st May 1was a significant day to remember and pay glowing tributes to all those labourers, who worked for the economic prosperity, and development of the country and sacrificed their lives for Pakistan.
Like other 80 countries in the world, International Labour Day was also observed in Pakistan to pay homage to the services of the labour class.
Every year, Labour Day was observed in memory of Chicago workers, who were killed by police while striking for an eight-hour workday in 1886.
In Pakistan, May 01 was officially declared as a public holiday after its inclusion in the first labour policy in 1972.
“The policy led to formulation of a social security network, old age benefit schemes and workers welfare fund while the 1973 constitution ensured all rights to labour class,” said Syed Noman Bukhari, senior lawyer of trade and labour laws and member of Peshawar High Court Bar Association (PHCBA) while talking to APP.
He said Pakistan was a member of the International Labour Organization (ILO) after its independence in 1947 and had protected all rights of the labourers including the right of union and jobs in the 1973 constitution.
He said Pakistan had ratified 36 ILO conventions of which eight were important, thus empowering labourers of all rights.
The Labour and Culture Department KP spokesman said that several housing projects were launched for the labourers.
He said 2,056 flats at Labour City Regi Lalma Peshawar for registered industrial workers were constructed. Funds had been allocated for sanitation, water and street lights in Mardan Labour Colony.
Ikhtair Wali Khan, PML-N KP spokesman and former MPA said the minimum labour wage had been increased to Rs25,000 per month, whereas the federal government had planned to send around one million skilled labourers abroad for employment this year.
As many as sixteen countries including South Korea, Japan, Saudi Arabia, Azerbaijan, Iraq, Romania, Portugal and Malta had shown keen interest in hiring services of our skilled labourers, he added. Since April last year, over 0.6 million Pakistanis were sent abroad for employment.
He said the one-window OPF facilitation desk at Bacha Khan Airport Peshawar, having representatives of 13 departments including PIA, NADRA, Immigration and Passport, Ministry of Religious Affairs, Customs, ANF, Bureau of Immigration and Overseas Employment, ASF, Overseas Employment Corporation, CAA and Overseas Pakistanis Foundation, was established to swiftly address complaints of overseas Pakistanis.
The allocation of five percent quota in public sector universities for children of overseas Pakistanis and financial support in the shape of payment of fees to them in foreign universities through the Higher Education Commission was planned.
Overseas Pakistanis Foundation housing scheme had been launched at Budhni Road, Peshawar, which encompasses 681 residential and 74 commercial plots for labourers, he added.
Provincial President Peoples Labor Bureau KP, Shah Zulqarnain said the then PPP governments had increased salaries of labourers by 150 percent, besides giving them shares in the profits of companies and regularising their jobs.
Provincial President of Pakistan Peoples’ Party KP and Minister for State, Muhammad Ali Shah Bacha said the employees and labourers were given all due shares in the government and semi-government organizations during the government of Benazir Bhutto Shaheed.
Under the new labour policy, he said around 400 percent of the workers’ salaries were increased and services of the temporary workers were regularized besides the restoration of the sacked employees.
APP/fam/ati
