Arya News - Pakistan is heavily dependent on its labour class economically, yet the country has not been able to give due weight and importance to the rights and interests of its labourers, according to a 2019 Sindh High Court-commissioned report.
ISLAMABAD – The question is, who is in charge of pointing out such practices and putting an end to them?
Asadullah Khan sits on a chair outside a washed-out old building for 12 hours every day in the punishing Karachi heat. Wearing a navy blue uniform, the security guard leaves his house near Ziauddin Hospital in Clifton right after Fajr prayer to walk the 10-kilometre stretch to his workplace in Saddar. It takes him two hours every day to reach on time for a job that pays a meagre Rs25,000 each month.
By noon, the humidity forces him to take off his sweat-drenched shirt and dry it off by placing it in front of the shabby fan available in the parking area of his office building. This is also when he steals some time to cool off in front of the same fan.
At around 7 pm, it is time for him to walk another two hours back to his one-room apartment that he shares with his family of five.
“I have to pay Rs7,000 rent from my salary for the room, but we get by,” he said, with a smile, a permanent fixture on his otherwise worn face.
Asadullah is not even aware that what he is earning is 33 per cent below the minimum wage fixed by the Government of Pakistan. The federal minimum wage was set at Rs37,000 for the outgoing fiscal year of 2024-2025, according to the 2024 notification, which had increased by 15.6pc from the previous year. For the current fiscal year 2025-2026, the government decided to maintain the minimum wage at Rs37,000.
According to the Sindh Assembly’s Public Accounts Committee (PAC), over 80pc of private industrial units are not implementing the order of minimum wage.
“Around 95pc of factories do not give minimum wage to their workers,” Nasir Mansoor, General Secretary of the National Trade Union Federation (NTUF), told Dawn.com .
Asadullah, completely alien to his right to demand the minimum wage, said that his employer increased his salary whenever he requested it. When asked what he thought his rightful salary was, he replied: “Maybe Rs30,000?”
Pakistan is heavily dependent on its labour class economically, yet the country has not been able to give due weight and importance to the rights and interests of its labourers, according to a 2019 Sindh High Court-commissioned report.
“The ‘industry’ of a nation is always the backbone of its economy, which normally depends upon the labour class,” the report highlighted.
‘Wage theft’
Seated in a cramped, 5x5ft room with dark brown walls, where the breeze from the windows offered the only relief from Karachi’s scorching heat and humidity, Manesh Das* wore a ferozi-coloured kurta , stained with patches of brown that had almost altered its original hue. His kurta was drenched in sweat, and his brown skin glistened with it.
Das had left his family of six — his wife and children — with his parents and siblings in Tando Mohammad Khan four to five months ago, hoping to break free from the shackles of the zamindar he once worked for, who paid him only in crops, never in money. Kumar had believed that moving to the city would at least allow him to send some money back home.
But from his meagre salary of Rs15,600 received in weekly instalments — earned by sweeping roughly a one-kilometre stretch in Ranchor Line every day from 8am to 3pm — he is only able to send Rs8,000 to Rs10,000 home.
“Even going home costs almost Rs4,000 to Rs5,000, which we cannot afford,” he said.
Labour rights activist Naeem Sadiq, during an interview with Dawn.com , explained that the national minimum wage for unskilled workers is set at Rs37,000 for an 8-hour daily shift, for working 26 days per month (the wages slightly vary by skill level and province). If a worker puts in overtime, they are entitled to receive double their regular hourly wage.
Citing the example of the Sindh Solid Waste Management Board (SSWMB), where Das is currently employed, Sadiq calculated approximately Rs2.4 billion in annual wage theft by the institution.
According to the rights activist, the SSWMB employs 12,000 sanitation workers. Each employee is paid approximately Rs20,000 per month, which means there was a Rs17,000 worth of stolen wages from each employee per month, entailing that each worker is owed Rs200,000 just for the year 2024-25.
“Now imagine Rs17,000 being stolen per person per month for 12,000 people. It comes to Rs2.4 billion per year. So, Rs2.4 billion is being distributed among the top guys as a bribe. Not as a bribe, as stealing, as wage theft.”
For his part, Tariq Ali Nizamani, the SSWMB’s managing director, told Dawn.com that the board is currently responsible for managing waste for 70pc of Karachi, for which they have approximately 10,000 people as part of the sanitation force, and another 5000 workers comprising their drivers, helpers, and on-ground management staff.
The SSWMB hires these workers through a third party. According to Nizamani, they direct the contractors to pay the minimum wage set by the government. He was positive that they pay this amount to the workers on the street, as they have methods to ensure that.
“We have an in-house committee; our officers and the assistant director work in the zone. The deputy director is working in the district. Plus, we have not received any such complaint that they are getting less salary.”
But the ground realities narrate a different story.
Hussain Amir*, a resident of Lyari, works as a rickshaw driver for a company contracted by the SSWMB. Before he was fired for complaining, he earned Rs32,000 while driving a garbage truck. As a result of that complaint a few months ago, he was dismissed. After much pleading, he has managed to return to the same company—this time as a rickshaw driver—on a reduced salary, and now earns a mere Rs25,000.
Das, the sweeper, could only partially speak Urdu, but one thing he made sure to communicate clearly was that he did not want his name or picture included in the story — as there had been cases of workers being fired for complaining.
“They do not issue any contractual letters to workers to prevent them from unionising — because if they do, we will help them file complaints and ensure their contractors abide by the law,” Zulfiqar Shah, Chairman of the All Pakistan Local Government Workers Federation, told Dawn.com .
Karachi South is under contract with a Turkish company, Aysis , Shah added — a detail that was also confirmed by Nizamani.
According to Shah, sweepers and drivers like Das and Abid have been hired through fourth- and fifth-party contractors.
“The companies have resorted to petty contracting — asking their people to recruit groups of workers to make up the required labour force.”
Das’s fellow sweeper, Karim Akash*, comes from a village in Hyderabad. Like Das, he finds any space he can at the Karachi Metropoltian Cooperation (KMC) workshop to sleep, and relies on Saylani Welfare Trust for food. He confirmed that there is no written agreement with the person who hired them.
“I was told about this job by a contractor in my village, who then connected me with a contractor here.”
“Every morning, he [the contractor] takes our picture to mark attendance. A supervisor comes to count the number of workers. He [the supervisor] gives the money to the contractor, and we are paid in cash every week,” Akash added.
When Dawn.com reached out to Nizamani again after receiving this information, he again mentioned that there have been no direct complaints, however, they have received some indirect complaints due to which they are already talking to contractors about putting the sanitation workers on a payroll.
He also requested Dawn.com to speak to him after reading a write-up by the board which said, “The SSWMB had made contracts for provision of sanitation services with the international companies registered in Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP).”
“The said contracts are clear that the SSWMB will pay the companies for their verified provided services as per the contract and shall impose penalties for any highlighted negligence as prescribed in the contracts.”
The write-up elaborated that the, “SSWMB has neither hired directly or indirectly any sanitation worker nor paid any wages to any sanitation worker. The companies being in service contract with SSWMB are being paid for the services which they provide under the Service Contract Agreements, and companies are bound to abide all prevailing laws of the Government.”
“Such allegation over SSWMB regarding payment of mere pittance to sanitation workers of Karachi and Hyderabad who work as third party daily wagers is denied,” it stated.
Is minimum wage enough?
According to the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP), a monthly income of over Rs75,000 is required to support a family of six with basic necessities such as food, housing, utilities, healthcare and education.
The HRCP has urged that wages must reflect the principle that “full-time workers should be able to live with security, health and hope,” as the government prepared to announce the federal budget of the upcoming fiscal year 2025-2026.
The Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) also demanded a raise in minimum wage from Rs37,000 to Rs50,000 prior to the budget announcement.
Citing a World Bank report , PPP’s Labour Bureau Head Chaudhry Manzoor Ahmed said that 44pc of the population is living below the poverty line and called for better health facilities for industrial workers and an increase in their death and marriage grants.
Hina Amin*, a machine operator at a denim manufacturing factory in Korangi’s industrial area, doesn’t even care for a raise. Before even waiting to hear the full question about her wage, she started expressing her frustration regarding the untimely payment of salary.
“Why do people work? You tell me. They work for a livelihood.” Amin exclaimed.
“Believe me, we have to fight and protest for our month’s salary. If we protest, we are thrown out,” she added.
Amin is salaried at the minimum wage of Rs37,000. She spends at least Rs60 daily travelling to and from work, in addition to her rent, bills, and grocery. Since the factory does not have a canteen, the workers have to manage their food as well. Sometimes, even when a worker scheduled for a 9am to 6pm shift arrives a few minutes before 9, they are still marked late — resulting in a further deduction from their salary.
When asked if she had tried to request a higher salary to make ends meet, she complained that the workers were already not receiving their salaries on time, which was her primary concern.
“First, they should at least give us our salaries on time so that we don’t have to take loans to pay our rents. Then comes the topic of salary increase,” she stated.
“If we say anything, they will kick us out […] we are helpless,” she added.
Sadiq echoed Amin’s thoughts on the matter. He said that in an ideal world, the minimum wage should be at least Rs60,000. “We should and we will certainly push for those wages.”
However, “this discussion should normally begin after workers are getting what is already the minimum wage,” he stressed.
“Sadly, right now, we are fighting for every morsel and every breath.”
‘There is no way to save them’
So who decides what the minimum wage should be? Who ensures it is abided by? And whom does one turn to when it’s not?
Labour law expert, Danish Nayyer, explained that following the 18th Amendment, labour laws were devolved to the provinces. Now, all provinces have their own laws and procedures for declaring and implementing minimum wages.
Nayyer told Dawn.com that in Sindh, the Sindh Minimum Wages Act, 2015 governed the area. In pursuance of the Act, the Labour and Human Resources Department of the provincial government declared the minimum wage. Currently, the minimum wage for unskilled workers is fixed at Rs37,000, similar to the federal level.
Last year, following the announcement of the budget for 2024-2025, Public Accounts Committee Chairman Nisar Ahmed Khuhro admitted to the violation of labours laws and directed the Sindh Employees Social Security Institution (SESSI) and the labour department to strictly implement the policy of providing the minimum monthly wage to all workers across the province after reviewing the audit reports of SESSI for the years 2018 and 2019.
Speaking to Dawn.com , SESSI commissioner, Miandad Rahoojo, explained that the institution has around 780,000 registered workers, all of whom are receiving at least the minimum wage. The commissioner admitted, however, to a mass violation of minimum wage laws across Sindh, including some “serious” cases of violations, especially at brick kilns where the lives of workers resemble “the worst form of slavery”.
“Even pre-Islamic times were not as bad as this,” he lamented.
Rahoojo said, however, that the responsibility of ensuring the implementation of wage laws and of maintaining a complete digital base for it is on the Labour Department, clarifying that SESSI does not cater to any complaints regarding the violation of the law either.
“SESSI doesn’t cater to these complaints. There is a minimum wage board, which announces [the wage] and the labour department ensures its implementation. SESSI only registers the workers who get the minimum wage. In a way, SESSI has a role in the reactive way.”
The secretary of the Minimum Wage Board, Naeem Mangi, had a similar response.
“When it comes to the question of implementation, it is the responsibility of the labour department; we only fix the minimum wages,” he concurred.
He said their board often received complaints through the PM’s Portal regarding violation of the minimum wage law; however, if the investigation starts, the company would usually fire that employee.
“There is no way to save them.”
Where to file a complaint?
NTUF General Secretary Mansoor told Dawn.com that one can complain against the employer to the joint director of the labour department. “There is no cost of complaint.”
However, there is no helpline for complaints or any awareness campaigns for employees like Asadullah and Haq to educate them on their rights and processes to raise their voice in the case of violation of their rights.
The lawyer, Nayyer, explained that under the Sindh Payment of Minimum Wage Act , if an employee wants to report a case of underpayment, they must file a complaint to the Payment of Wages Authority.
“There is no helpline with respect to filing any complaint; the complaint has to be made in writing and filed before the authority,” Nayyer stated.
“The employee can either file the complaint directly in their personal capacity, for which there are no costs, or they can choose to file the complaint through a lawyer; the legal fee varies from lawyer to lawyer.”
Nayyer added that the authority writes to the employer once they have received a complaint.
As to who would act as the final arbiter in this scenario, the the Sindh Minimum Wage Act 2015 states: “Government may, by notification in the official Gazette, appoint any person to be authority for any area, specified in the notification, to hear and decide all claims arising out of non- payment, or delay in the payment of wages to workers in that area whose minimum rates of wages have been declared under the provisions of this Act.”
“Both parties then get the right to a hearing, they can make the employer pay you a minimum wage and can pass an order,” Nayyer elaborated.
“Under the Sindh Minimum Wages Act 2015 and its rules , the Sindh Minimum Wages Rules, 2021, the Authority has the powers under the Sindh Land Revenue Act, 1976 to seize or attach bank accounts of employers in case they do not comply with the payment of minimum wages,” Nayyer elaborated.
As per the Sindh Minimum Wage Act 2015, Section 9(3):
“Any employer who contravenes the provisions of this section shall be punishable with imprisonment for a term which may extend to six months or with fine which may extend to fifty thousand rupees but not less than twenty thousand rupees or with both, in addition to payment of sum not less than the difference in wages actually paid to the worker and the amount which would have been paid to him had there been no such contravention.”
Inspecting violation
Awais Ali Chandio, a machine operator at a denim manufacturing factory in Karachi’s Korangi, is salaried at Rs37,000 but must put in at least 50 hours overtime per month to meet his family’s needs. Luckily, since he is a company employee, he gets double his hourly rate — Rs300 per hour — until he works 50 hours as overtime per month. Beyond that, he receives the usual Rs150 for each hour of overtime work.
Unfortunately, though, the contractual employees at his company do not share the same perks despite fulfilling the same duties as Chandio’s.
“They get paid somewhere between Rs28,000 to Rs32,000; their overtime rate is also just Rs100 per hour,” said Chandio.
Although it is not company policy, employees at Chandio’s workplace are still hired on a contractual basis.
“The management pulls this off to fill their stomachs. This way, they are able to make at least Rs20,000 per employee,” he said, while criticising the managers, adding that the company had around 200 to 250 contractual employees hidden among a few thousand company employees.
The question is, who is in charge of pointing out such practices and putting an end to them?
As per the 2019 SHC report, in order to monitor “whether application of minimum wage has been observed as set down by the Government of Sindh, the inspectors had been appointed under section 14 of the Act 2015.”
It elaborated on the inspection system.
“The purpose of appointing inspectors is to carry out inspections under Rule 22 of the West Pakistan Minimum Wages Rules 1962 which states, that if any inspector during the inspection detects any irregularity on the part of employer, they should advise management of the establishment to rectify the same and in case of further violation of minimum wage laws, such establishments should be prosecuted in the Court of Law.
“During the visits of [the] Commission across Sindh, it was observed that several posts of inspectors within the meaning of Section 14 of the Act 2015, were lying vacant,” the report said.
It added that, “When it was asked of the Secretary Labour Department and the Chairman Minimum Board as to whether any violation of minimum wages had been detected, they denied the fact regarding the violation of Sindh Minimum Wages Act.”
“In case of any violation of Minimum Wages, such establishments are prosecuted in the court of law,” the report cited Saeed Saleh Jumani, Incharge Chairman Minimum Wage Board.
“Labour inspector, labour officer, assistant director, director, deputy director and joint director go to factories and organisations to implement wage laws […] only they know what happens then,” Mangi commented.
Why the ‘poor implementation’?
For civil rights activist and lawyer, Jibran Nasir, workers’ rights remain poorly protected in Sindh due to systemic failures of both the Labour Department and SESSI.
He highlighted SESSI’s failure in recovering over Rs500 million in outstanding dues from employers and “eroding employees’ trust” by ignoring reimbursement claims of medical expenses by employees for three years.
Jibran also criticised the Labour Department for not producing records of any formal complaints regarding non-payment of minimum wage, despite widespread evidence of violations. “It also failed to present even a record of complaints received, reflecting weak enforcement and worker fear. There is no updated or integrated database of workers or businesses, severely limiting oversight,” he said.
Each year, the federal government releases a notification updating the minimum wage after the budget release, often only after much pressure from trade unions and activists, said Sadiq. This alone speaks volumes of the authorities’ priorities when it comes to those at the bottom rung of the economic ladder.
“People like me often push for the notification after the budget is released, as the minimum wage notification is often missing,” said Sadiq. “Ultimately, the minimum wage notification is issued somewhere in September.”
Sporadically, the government runs campaigns to implement minimum wage laws and spread awareness. According to SESSI’s Rahoojo, his department has run several awareness campaigns over the years. “We have launched a campaign for awareness. We are meeting every trade association to ask them to register employees,” he said. The employers, however, usually resist registering the workers and paying them minimum wage, he added.
“If the employer has 1,000 workers, he would register 50 of them. This is discrimination,” he lamented.
For Jibran Nasir though, this is all a hogwash. “Annual increases in minimum wage appear more performative than impactful, as poor implementation, official apathy, and corruption prevent these measures from translating into real benefits,” he said, marking it as the main reason workers remain largely unprotected and excluded from basic legal entitlements.
Challenges faced by the industry
At a post-budget press conference last month, Minister of Finance Muhammad Aurangzeb, when questioned on giving a 10pc raise to civil servants while maintaining status quo on the minimum wage in the current fiscal year, requested to raise this question with industrial associations and “get their feedback on it.”
He mentioned the industry’s “big question on formal versus informal sector” and linked the question of minimum wage with industry competitiveness.
“I think at this point, we are at a good place with minimum wage,” he added.
The industry, it appears, seems to agree with him. According to federation of Pakistan Chambers of Commerce and Industry’s Marketing Director Faizul Haq, it is important to apply these laws in a gradual, phased and “realistic fashion” by keeping account of the ground realities and the capacity of businesses, “specifically small, medium enterprises to pay their labour.”
“The main point here primarily concerns the cost of doing business, and wages are an important and significant component of the same.”
Speaking on condition of anonymity, the Chief Financial Officer of a major export company told Dawn.com that while the objective behind minimum wage laws is good, which is to improve the lives of the workers, lawmakers need to think about demand in the economic engine in the “real sense”.
“Businesses, especially the labour-intensive ones, are facing challenges due to a slowdown in demand. So, policy makers also need to think about creating an enabling environment.”
Faizul, on the other hand, while explaining the cyclical nature of business, highlighted the drawbacks of not factoring in economic compulsions while fixing minimum wages.
“If you burden the businesses, the ultimate cost would be paid by the consumers, and it would result in inflation because if the products or services are costlier, the cost would ultimately be transferred to the end consumers.”
“The whole cycle needs to be understood, and it has to be done in consultation with the business community.” He emphasised the importance of dealing with this issue, keeping in mind the economic outcomes instead of the political ones.
“We have to understand that this is an economic question rather than a political question […] this is a cycle and this cycle needs to be understood in a phased and logical manner.”
For the security guard Asadullah and millions like him, the wrangling between the industrialists and the government holds little meaning. He will likely continue to work for a pittance, as authorities and business owners continue to point fingers, with little thought or concern for the plight of workers who find it increasingly difficult to make ends meet even if they are lucky to get minimum wage.