Report from BDS

According to the report, garment workers take regular loans from different sources to reduce the burden of additional expenditures and reduce the cost of food and lodging. On average, a garment worker works overtime for up to 60 hours a day as well as an average of eight hours of work. As a result, the workers are deprived of necessary sleep and rest.

Taslima Akhter said, 'All progressive labor organizations, including garment workers' solidarity, rejected the proposal of minimum wage of 6,360 taka from the owners.'

Member of National Committee for Safeguarding Oil and Gas Professor Anu Muhammad said in his speech that the minimum wage of any industry is determined based on the strength of the workers and the owners. Therefore, to strengthen the minimum wage, the workers must work together to increase the strength of the organization.

In response, Center for Policy Dialogue (CPD) research director Khondoker Golam Moazzem said, the government and the owners that the minimum wage is determined, is not enough to ensure the minimum living standards of the garment workers.

In this context, Professor of Dhaka University Tanjimuddin said, although the government has several tax benefits for garment workers, it is not thinking about the welfare of the workers. Instead of paying the owner, the government should ensure free education, medical services and other services for the workers' families. Garment workers' rights activist Co-ordinator Mahbubur Rahman Ismail said in his speech that garment workers are living a lowly life compared to the prison's prisoners.

Syed Sultan Uddin Ahmed, Executive Director of Biswas, a non-governmental organization of labor, said, "We have weaknesses in the international market bargain and the responsibility of this failure is to book the country's working class alone."

Trade union federation president Shah Atiul Islam, president of garment workers front Ahsan Habib Bulbul, president of women's welfare committee Shyamoli government, BRAC University teacher Syuti Sabur and Dhaka University teacher Moshahida Sultana took part in the meeting.