AN INCREASE in workplace death by 22 per cent in the first half of 2024 from the 2023 corresponding period points to a continued criminal negligence on part of the authorities in ensuring workplace safety and labour rights. A Safety and Rights Society report, made public on July 1, says that at least 475 workers died and many became injured in 420 workplace accidents in January鈥揓une. The number of workplace death was 389 in the corresponding 2023 period. The transport sector has continued to be the most risky, with at least 250 people having died. At least 74 people died in the services sector, which included workshops and gas and electric supply establishments; 66 in the agricultural sector; 52 in the construction sector; and 33 in factories and other manufacturing establishments. The chaotic road regime is reported to have taken the highest toll, with 310 workers having died in road accidents. At least 52 died from electrocution, 51 died by lightning strike, 23 died falling from a height and 15 were struck or crushed by heavy objects. Besides, eight were exposed to chemicals or toxic gases in septic or water tanks, six died by drowning, three died in fires or explosions, one died from a girder collapse and six died from other causes.
This is gravely concerning because while workplace accidents and consequent deaths and injuries have continued to increase every year, all that the authorities have come up with are mere promises and no tangible action. Workplace death registered a 48 per cent increase in 2023, when, keeping to a Bangladesh Occupational Safety, Health and Environment Foundation report, at least 329 workers died in the formal sector while 1,103 workers died in the informal sector in workplace accidents. Occupational safety has, in fact, all along been a neglected area. After every major workplace disaster, the authorities routinely come up with promises of action, but the promises are rarely kept. It is no wonder that the Global Rights Index, published by the International Trade Union Confederation, has ranked Bangladesh among the 10 worst countries for workers for eight consecutive years since 2017. The 2024 ITUC Global Rights Index specifies a severe lack of workplace safety measures, violent repression of worker movement, mass dismissal and arrest of union leaders and labour rights activists and restricted rights to unionism as worrying violations in Bangladesh. What is also concerning is the lack of oversight in the informal sector where labour laws are largely ignored and workplace accidents abound.
The government must, therefore, attend to the issues that have contributed to an alarming state of workplace safety. The government must ensure labour rights, improve legal and policy frameworks, systems and services related to labour rights and facilitate rights to unionism. The government must investigate all workplace accidents, compensate the victims and the families and bring negligent employers and authorities to justice.