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RANJHAN HAS SPENT 40 years working in a Pakistani brick kiln as a bonded labourer, tied to his employer by a debt his pitiful salary will never enable him to repay.
He is one of more than two million Pakistanis that campaigners say are trapped in “modern-day slavery”, condemned to a lifetime of hardship and toil.
There are laws in place to outlaw bonded labour, but still the cycle continues, with thousands of children sucked in every year by their parents’ supposed debts.
At an open-air factory on the edge of Hyderabad, around 150 kilometres (90 miles) north of Karachi, tall, tapering chimneys belch out noxious smoke.
Crouching children gather lumps of clay and pack them into rectangular moulds. On the ground, long rows of unbaked bricks wait to go into the kiln.
These are the scenes that have been the backdrop to Ranjhan’s life since he was a child.
“I’ve spent the last 40-odd years in this grind, sometimes in one factory, sometimes in another,” he said.
He works every day of the week at the coal-fired kiln, where 1,000 bricks will earn him around $2, every cent of which goes straight back to his employer.
“I borrowed 40,000-50,000 rupees ($400-500) to buy food for my children. I will never pay it back before I die — my debt will die with me,” the father-of-three told AFP away from the eyes of his boss.
A global survey of slavery published last month by the Australian campaign group the Walk Free Foundation said Pakistan had the third most “slaves” in the world, after India and China, most of them working in brick making or agriculture.
Walk Free says the government needs to act to tackle the problem, including by regulating brick kilns and enforcing anti-slavery laws.
Wages go to boss
About the origin of his debt and that of his parents before him, Ranjhan says little.
From buying food to wedding dowries to hospital visits — there is no shortage of reasons why these impoverished workers would go to their boss for a loan which they can then never pay back.
Once the debt begins, the employer too has no shortage of reasons to keep adding to it — exorbitant charges for accommodation and food are typical — so the worker has no chance of ever paying it off.
“Everything we earn goes to our creditor who gives us food to eat,” said Ranjhan.
Brick factories and farms across the country run on these workers, who are fed for a pittance on bread, lentils, oil, sugar and onions.
Some small trade unions are trying improve the situation, lobbying bosses to raise salaries to the equivalent of $5 dollars a day and not to trap their workers in the debt cycle.
“Before the union, the workers here didn’t even have names, just numbers. If someone came and asked them their name, they’d say ‘Ask the boss, he’ll tell you’,” said Puno Bheel, who set up a brickworkers’ union in Hyderabad a few years ago.
But despite their best efforts the unions are fighting a difficult battle. A few employers may have improved wages and conditions, but the unions have not persuaded any to free bonded labourers.
‘Village of the free’
But some, like Sajan Kumar, have been able to escape.
Five years ago the owner of a rice and pepper farm where he had worked for years with his family demanded $4,500, claiming their work had not covered the cost of feeding them.
Kumar’s uncle went to the Green Rural Development Organisation, a campaign group, which took the matter to court.
The owner and his men threw Kumar and his family in vehicles and drove them into the desert “chained like animals”, Kumar says.
After days being held in the desert, the 87 members of Kumar’s extended family, all from the Hindu minority, were recovered by the police.
“It was slavery, what else would you call it? We were treated like animals, we worked day and night,” said Kumar.
Once freed, the family pursued the matter further, accusing the landowner of illegal detention, an unusually audacious move in a country where the rich and powerful rule virtually unchallenged in rural areas.
Kumar and his family got more than $20,000 in an out-of-court settlement — a rare victory despite a law banning bonded labour being on the statute books since the early 1990s.
He now lives in the village of Azad Nagar, near Hyderabad, which is populated by former bonded labourers.
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Let’s not forget the tens of thousands of spaces being use to build world cup stadiums in Qatar. It is modern day slavery and a major organisation in our developed West has no problem hosting the world cup there.
Boycott the world cup in Qatar.
@Horgay
For once, I agree with you. FIFA is a corrupt organisation.
@ Horgay. …. Also see the camel racing child slaves (as young as three) The camels have a hospital with a swimming pool (I kid you not) the children (kidnapped from the Indian sub continent) sleep in sheds where they are half starved, (to keep the weight down) beaten and are sexuality abused, according to a CH4 TV documentry.
Dubai is the same and been going on longer. Last time I was there I took to the streets and met some of the people. I came home and offered the story free to a few newspapers and none were interested
https://vimeo.com/82143242
This is disgraceful and it still goes on in Dubai and Saudi. So many “migrant workers” are worked to death in almost 50 degree heat.
They are treated like pieces of dirt in the ME. Everyone is below the Arabs who think they are pharaohs.
I lived in Pakistan – loved the people and country. It’s a country of many contradictions, extreme wealth and dying poverty. What’s the hardest aspect to understand is that there are no support systems or care for the suffering of the poor. So sad.
Women stoned for adultery, sharia law, hatred for non believers and home of many Taliban and Al Qaeda brass! My friend was born and raised in Islamabad and the happiest day of his life was when he left! Didn’t an actress also get locked up for a long time for shooting a nothing scene!
She got sentenced but I think she’s appealing the sentence.
The Paki system is just a downscaled version of what you and I endure here. We are continually servicing the debt of the country. Oh wait–I meant *the presumed debt* of the country.
You and I and every living peson in ROI is forced to buy the equivalent of a Hyundai and give it away to the agents of investment bankers to repay Ireland’s banking debt.
Slavery, like most other forms of abuse, comes in many forms.
I think it’s a little different.
Comparing life in Ireland with $2 a day and real slavery is a no small bit insulting to these poor unfortunates.
We’re doing pretty well by comparison.
And use of the word “Paki”?
Seamus, let’s not lose the run of ourselves here. No comparison whatsoever , different planet altogether . We have no clue of real poverty in this country compared to third world countries.
Seamus, if that’s what you think why don’t you swap with a “paki” as you called them
Is the use of the word “paki” offensive? Surely it depends on the context which in this case appears non offensive. . Are you offended by the term “brit” also? Seems to me terribly PC to find offensive comments where there possibly none intended. Think the posters was lazily using the term as an abbreviation
Modern-day slavery is obviously a common problem in some Muslim-majority countries. Look at how the Emirati Ambassador to Ireland and his wife treated those Filipinas.
All week we read the whinging , self-pitying comments from the comrades here at the journal and then we read this which puts life into a real perspective. Patricia above just barely touched on what people in many parts of Asia do to survive and it is a lot worse than she describes. I travelled to many parts of the sub-Continent 50 years back and having spoken to folks who were in the really squalid places this summer I see that nothing has changed. I am not for one minute suggesting that we in the West should feel guilty or change our lifestyles but rather that we ensure that the governments of these abusive states are called out at every chance and that their people are provided with cheap energy, clean water and education. They are not stupid people and given the tools will rise above their poverty. A good start would be to ban most of the ‘charities’ and NGO’s from meddling.
Slavery represents the extreme of financial exploitation obviously benefiting the few at the expense of the many. Why should slavery elsewhere prevent Irish people objecting to another form of exploitation here in the form of a water tax, or indeed any other similar taxes based on the ‘obligation’ of the Irish taxpayer to refund the wealthy for their gambling debts ? ‘Self pitying comments’ my arse !
I totally disagree with holding people trapped like this, but it’s very sloppy journalism to say €300 in the heading and $400-$500 in the story when rs 40,000 is almost $640 (€510) and rs 50,000 is almost $800 (€640).
The only help we should give a country like this is education for women. A ban on fundamentalist religion and condoms/pill.
@ Leszlie. .yeah like that’s going to happen!
It will happen if we refuse to deal with countries that control with religion instead of democracy.
Meanwhile China has more than 1000 “láodòng gǎizào,” slave labour camps, slavery is widespread in the East and not confined to Pakistan.
It’s *your* fault the world is so terrible. Yes, YOU
Seamus McDermott you are absolutely right. People in the West are slaves too. Its just we have a higher standard of living. We work simply to service bank debts and buy life’s essentials. There is little left for anything else and there is precious little free time. What is that if not slavery ?
What dose it say of a country that has nuclear weapons, can’t feed its people and a culture that is rotten to the core.
Islam again. A motherfull of bad ides.
The boss needs a brick in the back of the head
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