The title in French means 'come help me'. This is the phrase from where the verbal code for distress "Mayday" is coined. I feel the hapless workers in Bangladesh are giving us the same signal.
It is estimated that the country currently has 2.5 crore unemployed people with 1.5 crore of them educated. They need work to maintain their family and find a place in the society. But what about the majority of others who are already employed from non-skilled to high-skilled jobs?
Let's start from the grass-root. People working in construction firms, hotels, brick-fields, shops and bazars, as day-laborers. They are unskilled, uneducated people, and to keep their families afloat, they work from dawn to dusk to try to earn their bread. They most often just subsist, dragging their lives through malnutrition, weakness, sickness and rapid deterioration of health conditions. They are human beings taking part in an almost impossible fight every morning. They don't have much to dream about; in fact, they don't dream at all. They are just trying to 'continue' their existence, and that urge is also due to man's primal instinct for survival.
Poets write poems on them, reporters often quiz them to cover their allotted pages, and some human rights organizations issue statements trying to attract our attention to the distressed condition of these people around us. We sympathize with them, and then go by our own ways.
The state is involved in another farce at this level, with these poor souls and the likes. Often these people are sent abroad to work, and most often, their conditions over there are beyond description. Take, for example, the case of Saudi Arabia. Bangladeshis in millions work there and the flow has never stopped completely. Recently, the Saudi government has initiated another step to recruit more workers of different skills for them.
Is there a statistics to show their standing in this foreign land? Have there been investigations and reports as to how these people are being treated there? And what about various allegations that had sprung up from time to time? Have they been verified?
If an account is started as to how they lead their lives in the face of adversity and suppression, then it would surely be a horrid one. But we are sending these helpless people there, and to some other parts of the world - and they are oppressed, inhumanely treated, overworked, underpaid, harassed in different forms and then kicked back home without any benefits.
Semi-skilled workers have a mentionable salary, but they still have their own, unique problems. They cannot decrease their living standards to go with the scanty salary they receive, neither can they live up to the standard that their job designation requires. Most often, either these people become corrupt or they lead a life full of grief and dissatisfaction.
But what about the educated, skilled and employed ones? Those who are in the public sector are well protected, even when they are not corrupt. But the situations in the private sector are the same story. Overwork, underpay, oppression, harassment, insecurity and very long work-hours. It is slavery in a different garment.
In total, the conditions of workforce of our country are very bad and further deteriorating every day. It will be interesting to monitor how much research in the social studies department is done regarding the issues and the scenario discussed here.
But that much can be safely said, that Labor day is much more than ensuring a holiday for those unfortunate laborers in different positions. It is also not about seminars and political talks and promises. It would best be observed if proper situation is realized and appropriate plan is chalked out to improve the conditions of workers and employees.
Otherwise, labors of Bangladesh will unite one day, and that brute, unpolished force may very well bring about another Bangladesh chapter of French revolution.
It is estimated that the country currently has 2.5 crore unemployed people with 1.5 crore of them educated. They need work to maintain their family and find a place in the society. But what about the majority of others who are already employed from non-skilled to high-skilled jobs?
Let's start from the grass-root. People working in construction firms, hotels, brick-fields, shops and bazars, as day-laborers. They are unskilled, uneducated people, and to keep their families afloat, they work from dawn to dusk to try to earn their bread. They most often just subsist, dragging their lives through malnutrition, weakness, sickness and rapid deterioration of health conditions. They are human beings taking part in an almost impossible fight every morning. They don't have much to dream about; in fact, they don't dream at all. They are just trying to 'continue' their existence, and that urge is also due to man's primal instinct for survival.
Poets write poems on them, reporters often quiz them to cover their allotted pages, and some human rights organizations issue statements trying to attract our attention to the distressed condition of these people around us. We sympathize with them, and then go by our own ways.
The state is involved in another farce at this level, with these poor souls and the likes. Often these people are sent abroad to work, and most often, their conditions over there are beyond description. Take, for example, the case of Saudi Arabia. Bangladeshis in millions work there and the flow has never stopped completely. Recently, the Saudi government has initiated another step to recruit more workers of different skills for them.
Is there a statistics to show their standing in this foreign land? Have there been investigations and reports as to how these people are being treated there? And what about various allegations that had sprung up from time to time? Have they been verified?
If an account is started as to how they lead their lives in the face of adversity and suppression, then it would surely be a horrid one. But we are sending these helpless people there, and to some other parts of the world - and they are oppressed, inhumanely treated, overworked, underpaid, harassed in different forms and then kicked back home without any benefits.
Semi-skilled workers have a mentionable salary, but they still have their own, unique problems. They cannot decrease their living standards to go with the scanty salary they receive, neither can they live up to the standard that their job designation requires. Most often, either these people become corrupt or they lead a life full of grief and dissatisfaction.
But what about the educated, skilled and employed ones? Those who are in the public sector are well protected, even when they are not corrupt. But the situations in the private sector are the same story. Overwork, underpay, oppression, harassment, insecurity and very long work-hours. It is slavery in a different garment.
In total, the conditions of workforce of our country are very bad and further deteriorating every day. It will be interesting to monitor how much research in the social studies department is done regarding the issues and the scenario discussed here.
But that much can be safely said, that Labor day is much more than ensuring a holiday for those unfortunate laborers in different positions. It is also not about seminars and political talks and promises. It would best be observed if proper situation is realized and appropriate plan is chalked out to improve the conditions of workers and employees.
Otherwise, labors of Bangladesh will unite one day, and that brute, unpolished force may very well bring about another Bangladesh chapter of French revolution.
