The readymade garment workers have demanded anti-harassment committees at all apparel factories with a view to protecting their women colleagues from sexual harassment at their workplaces.
Bangladesh Garment Workers Solidarity at a human chain on Friday also demanded justice for the garment workers who are rape victims. A worker of Unique garment factory in Ashulia on January 15 was raped and on December 31 another garment worker was raped at Kafrul in Dhaka.
Garment leaders said that the factory managements were indifferent to workers’ safety and security while most of the factories were yet to form anti-harassment committees even after getting High Court orders.
According to a report of Karmojibi Nari, in collaboration with International Women’s Rights Action Watch Asia Pacific, 68% factories haven’t any anti-harassment committee while only 4% garment factories have harassment complaint receiver committees. The report also mentioned that about 14% RMG workers are victims of sexual harassment at their workplaces.
As per the estimation of the International Labour Organisation, there are 5,271 garment factories in Bangladesh as of June 2018.
Roughly 4.5 million people work in these garment factories that generate 80% of the country’s total export revenue. And significantly more than 85% of these workers are women.
But it is a shame that the women working in garment sector are easy victims of sexual harassment. For a competent government it should not be very difficult to protect them from sexual harassment.
Of course our girls are generally unsafe and they are not only raped but also fearlessly murdered. By politicising the police to the extent that they can now claim they have elected the government.
So discipline in police is not easy to be found. The government has damaged all the institutions of good government to its own peril.
Whether the government has the sense to realise what a failure it is to be helpful to the people. It survives through anti-people rigged elections. That should speak volumes for the failure of the government.
We feel sorry that the government is surrounded by such incompetent and irresponsible men and women that they should be considered a shameful liability for the government in any other country.
