Sundar follow-up: Litigation over inheritance delays compensation payment

Labour secy says the government has also arranged accommodation for six families

LAHORE: The compensation cheques for families of those who lost their lives in a building collapse at the Sundar Industrial Estate have been delivered to all but one, The Express Tribune has learnt.

A court case to determine the legal heirs of Amin Shahzad, one of the deceased workers, has delayed the issuance of the only remaining cheque.

Shahzad’s brothers have submitted that he had divorced his wife, a first cousin, three years ago and she and her son were no longer eligible for inheritance.

Talking to The Tribune, Muhammad Tariq, a brother of Shahzad’s former wife, said that both families stopped seeing her because she married a man from a lower caste following her separation from Shahzad. “She has nothing to do with us now,” he says.

Labour Secretary Ali Sarfaraz Hussain says the cheque will be issued as soon as the dispute over Shahzad’s inheritance was settled by the relevant court.

He says funds for payment of compensation have been collected, among other sources, from the Workers Welfare Board.

He says the government has also arranged accommodation for six families. “None of these families owned a house,” he says. Two of them are from Kasur, one each from Jhang, Vehari, Toba Tek Singh and Lahore.

The labour secretary says that under the Workmen Compensation Act of 1923 the factory owner owes Rs20 million in compensation to the families of the deceased. He says because the owner has also died in the accident, his heirs are now liable for the amount.

Among families that have received cheques, at least one is unable to open a bank account to cash it because the recipient, wife of Shakeel Raza, does not have a Computerised National Identity Card (CNIC).

Talking to The Tribune, Raza’s brother Mohsin Abbas says the widow had married Shakeel against the wishes of her family. “She cannot visit her parents’ home to collect the documents needed to apply for a CNIC,” he says.

Abbas also complains about a typo in the cheque. He says the name of his brother printed on the cheque is incorrect. “His name is Shakeel Raza.

The name printed on the cheque is Muhammad Shakeel,” he says. He says he has yet to approach the Labour Department with a complaint. “We are trying to sort out the CNIC issue first,” he says.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 29^th, 2015.