HYDERABAD, March 27 The Pakistan Workers Federation has threatened that the workers will take to the streets across the province if the factories fail to implement the labour laws, particularly, minimum wages of workers.

The additional general secretary of the federation, Mehboob Ali Qureshi, said at a news conference at the press club that the government had fixed the workers' minimum wages at Rs6,000 per month and made workers entitled to five per cent profit bonus but the announcements were not being implemented in letter and spirit.

The laws were on the statute books only while the workers were being deprived of all legal facilities. Many industrial organisations did not even issue appointment letters to workers and did not register them under the EOBI, depriving them of medical and other fringe facilities, he said.

He said that the employers denied holidays to workers even on public holidays and there was no provision for earned or casual leaves in the various types of contracts they made the workers sign. Without an appointment letter, a worker could not even approach the courts, he said.

The industrial organisations were openly violating the Factory Act 1934 but the labour department was not prepared to enforce its laws, Mr Qureshi said.

He said that the Industrial Relations Ordinance guaranteed union activities but wherever the workers tried to form unions, their services were terminated and false cases were registered against them.

He said that the federal and provincial governments had fixed minimum wages at Rs4,000 per month on July 1, 2006, increased them later to Rs4,600 in July 2007 and again raised them to Rs6,000 per month in July 2008.

Over 70 per cent of mill owners had refused to implement government notifications. Moreover, even this day, majority of employers were paying between Rs3,000 to Rs4,000 per month in flagrant violation of the law, Mr Qureshi regretted.

He alleged that the industries falsely put it in the record that the workers were being paid Rs6,000 per month and the poor employees could do nothing about it because they were mostly illiterate and ignorant.

He demanded that committees comprising officials of labour department, the federation and journalists should be formed, which should visit different factories and make inquiries about how much amount the workers were being paid.

He said that majority of workers had been deprived of all basic and legal facilities because of contract, work-charge or daily wage system.

The mill owners in many cases had formed pocket unions and got them registered with the labour department to undermine labour unions, which were true representatives of workers, he said.

He said that despite government notification, the factory owners were not implementing the quota in jobs for the disabled persons and sons of the employees.

Mr Qureshi said that the government had reinstated workers who were sacked in 1996-1998 but the factories did not bother to take notice of the notification.

He said that the government had appointed commissioner workmen compensation authority in each division to ensure payment of legal dues, compensation for accidents and group insurance money but the mill owners were not implementing the authority's orders.

Thousands of workers were employed in tailoring shops who were denied all legal facilities while employees of local bodies and HDA did not receive salary for months and in the HDA work-charge employees were paid only Rs2,000 per month against the government notification of Rs6,000 per month, he said.

He warned that if the government failed to take notice of injustices with industrial and commercial workers, the federation would be compelled to hold demonstrations across the province.