Industrial relations: Workers protest ‘false’ case against colleagues

Say six loom workers implicated ‘for demanding legal wage’.

FAISALABAD:

Dozens of power loom workers staged a protest demonstration on Tuesday over a case registered against six colleagues for allegedly vandalising factory property.

The protesters said that the charges were false. They alleged that six workers including Khaliq and Ashraf were implicated to discourage power loom workers’ struggle for a raise in their wages in accordance with the minimum wage law.

According to the FIR registered under Sections 147, 148, 149 and 427 of the Pakistan Penal Code, the workers are accused of vandalising the property of the loom in Baowala Sector on Jhang Road on Monday.

Labour Qaumi Movement general secretary Aslam Meraj, however, rejected the allegations. He said the men had had a quarrel with their employers over their wage. “They had put forth workers’ demand that they should be paid the minimum wage set by the government,” he said.

The protesters organised a rally from Jhang Road to the Labour Courts where they also staged a sit-in.

Addressing the rally, Baowala power loom workers union president Abdul Khaliq said the protest would continue until the police case was withdrawn and action taken against the loom owners for not paying employees in accordance with the law.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 4^th, 2012.