‘Ensure minimum wage of Tk 600 for stone crushers’

Thousands of stone-crushing labourers at Burimari land port in Patgram upazila of the district have been deprived of fair wages for long.

Lalmonirhat district general secretary of Sangjukta Sramik Federation Md Moniruzzaman said more than thirty thousand labourers are engaged in crushing stones in different stone crushing factories at the land port. There are around 4000 stone crushing machines at the port.

He further said that six to ten labourers run each machine to crush stones. They work in group. The labourers come from different areas of the upazila and work at the factories from morning till evening.

Nazrul Islam, a stone-crushing labourer, said they get a daily wage of Tk 400 for crushing stones. Of the amount, Tk 100 is spent on food and transport every day. They have to return home with Tk 300 or less than Tk 300 after working hard all day long.

Nazrul also said that it is very tough to run the family with the low income.

Another labourer Delwar Hossain said silicosis is an incurable lung disease caused by inhalation of silica dust. Many stone-crushing labourers have died of this disease while others have fallen ill. They are living inhuman lives.

He added that they have been doing stone-crushing work for a small wage as there is no other job opportunity in the area.

"If we demand fair wages, the stone crush machine owners will fire us. None can demand fair wages here in fear of losing jobs," said Delwar.

Khairul Islam, group leader of stone-crushing workers, said the labourers, who engaged in crushing stones, get a wage of Tk 400 each while the labourers who work as machine operator are paid Tk 500 every day. The workers do not get breakfast or lunch or any other facilities from the machine owners.

They have been demanding a minimum daily wage of Tk 600 for the labourers for long, but to no avail, said Khairul.

Contacted, Jamsher Ali, owner of a stone crusher, said all the stone-crushing labourers at the land port are paid the same wage. The labourers might have got low wage as there is no labour crisis here.

He would discuss the matter with other stone-crushing machine owners soon and think about the wages for the workers, he said.

District general secretary of Sangjukta Sramik Federation Moniruzzaman said those workers engaged in crushing stones in Burimari land port area are deprived of fair wages for long.

Soon they will inform the employers that no stone-crushing labourers will join the work unless they get fair wages, said Moniruzzaman, adding that they will go for a tougher movement to meet the demand if necessary.