Labour Day commemorated

Rawalpindi : All trade unions took out rallies in Rawalpindi on Sunday urging the government to provide them at least basic rights.

The trade unions including Wapda, Railways PREM Union, Metropolitan Corporation Union, and several others took out the rallies as part of International Labour Day observed across Pakistan like the rest of the world on 1st May. All trade unions have appreciated the government’s decision regarding the fixation of Rs25,000 salary per month of a labourer.

The activists of the All-Pakistan Trade Union Federation (APTUF), Water and Power Development Authority (Wapda) employees, clerks of the Education Department, sanitary workers, and employees of the C&W Department participated in the rallies in different parts of the city, particularly Kutcherry Road and in front of Rawalpindi Press Club.

A large number of workers, including women, took part in the rally. Holding banners and placards inscribed with slogans against inflation, loadshedding, privatisation, and bonded labour; they chanted slogans for the rights of working-class and pledged to continue their struggle.

The trade union employees in their speeches condemned the policies of the former government in which poor people could not even purchase kitchen items. They appealed to the present government to provide the maximum relief so they could lead a comfortable life.

All Pakistan Clerks Association (APCA) Central President Haji Muhammad Irshad said that government should provide all employees maximum relief in the next budget. Government and private workers cannot survive without the government’s help but the former government did not do so, he denounced.

Hundreds of activists of Pakistan Workers Confederation, Pakistan Mazdoor Ittehad, Hamdard Laboratories (Waqf) Pakistan Employees Welfare Union, Shaheen Workers Union, home-based workers, PHA Workers’ Union, brick kiln workers, Railway Union and Pakistan Union participated in the rallies. Government and private organisations also arranged different programmes regarding Labour Day.