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Trade unions, gender issues and the ready-made garment industry of Bangladesh Some cancelled their appointments again and again, while many unit union leaders simply did not turn up for interviews. Table 4 indicates the number of unit unions of our respondent federations that we were able to interview. Table 4: Unit unions of our respondent federations Name of respondent federations No. of unit unions interviewed Registered Federation A 5 Registered Federation B 5 Registered Federation C 3 Non-registered Federation E 3 Non-registered Federation F 7 Non-registered Federation G 4 Non-registered Federation H 1 b. Formations of the unit unions and their current status We hypothesized that one of the most important reasons that female garment workers could not form independent unit unions was their reluctance to be involved in any kind of organized industrial dispute with management unless they were forced to do so. We were proven to be correct on this account. The reason is very simple. Coming from different rural backgrounds marked by pervasive poverty, widespread illiteracy, and various kinds of social exploitation, most of the female garment workers were quite happy at the beginning merely to get jobs in various urban and suburban localities which, for the first time, provided them with the hope of leading decent lives. That is why, at the beginning, it did not bother them much that their wages were quite low, and their working environment not very congenial, nor were they troubled at not having proper appointment letters. Being unaware of modern industrial concepts such as job security, they simply tolerated the prevailing unhealthy working conditions, hoping to get better wages later by working overtime and, in the process, acquiring on-the-job training. But when these hopes were dashed by the attitudes of some garment factory owners, they started thinking of organizing against the management in order to take certain collective action like gherao, demonstrations, and/or work stoppages. It was at this stage that they started contacting the federations, some of whom were already in touch with some of their compatriots, to seek support for their future course of action, including the secret formation of unit unions. 199
Women’s employment in the textile manufacturing sectors of Bangladesh and Morocco Two thirds (19) of our respondent unit unions were formed with the direct initiative and support of the federations. Even those unit unions (nine) which tried to form their unions independently at the initial stage, had to seek the help and support of a federation at one stage or other. Only one succeeded in getting registration but even it could not sustain the union for long because the owners simply fired the office bearers on charges of “misconduct”, even though the Industrial Relations Ordinance of 1969 (Section 15) protected their jobs as trade union leaders. Subsequently, the office bearers, with the help of a federation, non-registered Federation F, filed a case at the First Labour Court. The case is still awaiting judgment. Table 5: Present conditions of the respondent registered unions Present conditions of unit unions Number of registered unit unions Still active 2 Still registered but not active 8 Claim to be registered but have no committee 1 Cases pending in labour courts 2 The federation and unit union leaders indicated in interviews that, among the 28 respondent unit unions, only 13 unions (12 from the 19 federation-initiated unions and one from the nine independently formed unions) were able to complete the full registration process and had succeeded in getting registration (Table 5). In the two factories where the units unions were still found to be active despite continuous harassment on the part of the management, the unit union leaders were successful in getting recognition from their owners as legitimate collective bargaining agents. Not only that, they have also successfully negotiated with the owners on behalf of the workers on issues related to timely payment of wages and improvement of the working environment in their respective factories. Among the 14 unit unions where registration procedures were claimed to be fruitless by the federation and unit union leaders, in five cases the registration procedure was stopped due to “harassment” by the owner. In the remaining nine cases, the applications for registration were rejected by the office of the Registrar of Trade Unions on what the federation and unit union leaders called “flimsy grounds”. The primary reasons for inactivation and non-existence of nine unit unions, as portrayed in Table 6, were both the voluntary migration (for better job prospects) and forced migration (due to the fear of harassment) of the office bearers of various unit unions. 200
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Women’s Employment in the Textile
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This United Nations Research Instit
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Acknowledgements Many people have b
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notwithstanding the inertia of the
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Carol Miller is a policy analyst on
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xii VII. Contribution of different
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Introduction 1 Introduction 1 Shahr
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Introduction Table 1: Basic indicat
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Introduction women have been tradit
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Introduction The chapters on Bangla
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Introduction occurs, on average, at
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Introduction women workers related
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Introduction in low-income countrie
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Introduction by repaying their “d
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Introduction participate in labour
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Introduction their bargaining power
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Introduction processing zones hypot
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Introduction IV. The case studies T
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Introduction experience in garment
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Introduction V. Conclusion Although
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Introduction improved technology. T
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Introduction References Afsar, R. (
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Introduction Household Power Relati
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Wage discrimination by gender in Mo
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Gender and employment in Moroccan t
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Gender dimensions of labour migrati
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Table 1: Total number of male and f
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