BANGLADESH having ranked among the 10 worst countries for working people in the 2024 ITUC Global Rights Index, which has been for the eighth consecutive year since 2017, is worrying in that it suggests that there has been no improvement in labour rights. The other countries in the bracket are Belarus, Ecuador, Egypt, Eswatini, Guatemala, Myanmar, the Philippines, Tunisia and T眉rkiye. The category in the index, which the International Trade Union Confederation has prepared for years, means that workers in Bangladesh have faced state repression, violent crackdown on peaceful protests by the industrial police and intimidation that prevents the formation of trade unions. The report 鈥� said to be a comprehensive review of worker rights in law, ranking 151 countries against 97 indicators derived from the ILO conventions and jurisprudence that assesses the situation on a scale from 1 to 5+ with violations recorded annually from April to March 鈥� gives Bangladesh the rating of 5, which indicates that there is not guarantee of rights for workers in the country. Bangladesh was not ranked among the 10 worst countries in the 2016 and the 2015 index, but even then, it was rated 5, with no guarantee for rights of the working people, signifying one of the worst countries to work in.
The minister of state for labour, however, seeks to dismiss the findings of the IUTC Global Rights Index, noting that the report does not reflect the current situation and is based on dated information. The minister, who says that Bangladesh is now the best country in terms of worker rights, brushes aside the findings of obstacles to trade union registration, noting that the process for trade union registration has been eased and made transparent. He further seeks to say that there is no basis for the rejection of trade union applications without valid grounds in the automated registration process. The minister鈥檚 statements appear business-as-usual remarks to shrug off responsibilities whenever some indexes or studies find problems in almost everything that the government does. The report says that the police killed several apparel workers during protests in 2023 and a union leader was murdered. It says that worker鈥檚 strikes faced police brutality and the draconian registration process rejected a half of the applications for the formation of trade unions for 4.5 million people in the apparel sector. The index further says that union activity was obstructed and blocked in the eight export processing zones in Bangladesh. In November 2023, the index says, up to 25,000 workers clashed with the police, who used live bullets, batons and tear-gas shells.
The International Trade Union Confederation says that workers are the beating heart of democracy and their right to be heard is crucial to the health and sustainability of democratic systems, noting that when worker rights are violated, democracy is attacked as democracy, trade union and worker rights go together. The government must, in such a situation, make a course correction and improve the rights situation of the working people not only to slide up notches in such indexes which matters in international trade but also to ensure a sound labour relations for benefits in terms of productivity, reduced conflicts and disputes and improved job satisfaction.