Observation (CEACR) - adopted 1996, published 85th ILC session (1997)

1. Further to its previous observations, the Committee notes the Government's latest report on measures taken to ensure the observance of the Convention. The Committee also has taken note of the discussion on the issues raised in its previous observation that took place in the Conference Committee on the Application of Standards in June 1996, and of the observation on the application of the Convention made by the New Zealand Council of Trade Unions (NZCTU) in a communication dated 18 June 1996, which included a 1996 report by Anti-Slavery International on debt bondage in Pakistan entitled "This menace of bonded labour", and was transmitted for comments to the Government on 26 June 1996. The Government has not replied to these observations. Finally, the Committee also has noted the Report of the Working Group on Contemporary Forms of Slavery of the UN Sub-Commission on Prevention of Discrimination and Protection of Minorities on its 21st Session (UN document E/CN.4/Sub.2/1996/24 dated 19 July 1996).

I. Bonded labour

Magnitude of the problem

2. In earlier comments, the Committee noted allegations brought before the United Nations that 20 million persons worked as bonded labourers, 7 million of whom were children. The Committee noted the Government's indication that these figures were unrealistic, an appreciation shared by the All Pakistan Federation of Trade Unions. While comparing the alleged numbers with statistical data concerning the labour force and total population of Pakistan, the Government had not put forth any figures of its own concerning the numbers of bonded labourers. However, the Committee noted from the country paper submitted by the Government to the Asian Regional Seminar on Children in Bondage (Islamabad, November 1992) that in Pakistan child labour mostly persisted because of poverty, lack of public awareness, lack of education facilities and parents' debt bondage. In areas where parents (being peasants/labourers) are forced to provide labour services to landlords/employers, their children are frequently trapped in debt bondage. Often, the parents are given a loan to meet some urgent needs. The debtor has then to repay by working. In practice, the debt does not decrease; it even climbs upwards. The whole family becomes permanently enslaved and the money-lender claims repayment from succeeding generations. Thus children are usually pledged as workers in part payment of debt. Children can also be enslaved on their own. Parents may send them to work in the house of a landlord or moneylender. These children may stay for many years, not knowing how long they must work, or even the size of the debt they are paying off. The Committee further noted the observation by the All Pakistan Federation of Trade Unions in its communication dated 13 October 1994 that persons are subjected to forced labour under the bonded labour system in rural and less developed areas by the feudal lords but also in some coal mines and brick kilns.

3. The Committee notes from the report by Anti-Slavery International communicated by the NZCTU in June 1996 the allegation that:

Over the past two decades, bonded labour in Pakistan has been most notorious in the brick kiln industry. This has grown rapidly in recent decades, with brick kilns springing up in large numbers as towns have expanded. In the last few years, the involvement of bonded child labourers in producing hand-knotted carpets for export has also received considerable publicity outside Pakistan. There are many other sectors of employment in which bonded labour has been the norm rather than the exception. Along with child labour, bonded labour is prevalent in the "informal" industrial sector. It is notable in agriculture, where landless workers are tied to landowners both by debts and by a form of serfdom. It is also reported among fishermen.

Visibility and perception of the problem

4. In its report received in November 1995, the Government, assessing the extent of the problem of bonded child labour, had pointed out that the cases of bonded child labour are not visible. As the Committee noted in its report to the 83rd (1996) Session of the Conference, lack of visibility or of perception appears to be more generally a difficulty in dealing with the problem of bonded labour, a difficulty not so far overcome by established machinery.

Statutory instruments and machinery to deal with bonded labour

5. In the report on debt bondage in Pakistan made by Anti-Slavery International and communicated by the NZCTU in June 1996, legislative and administrative developments are commented upon as follows:

(a) The Bhatta Mazdoor Mohaz (BMM), Brick Kiln Workers' Union, was formed in 1967. Its campaign focused initially on winning basic workers' rights by insisting that brick kiln workers were indeed "workers" as defined by Pakistan's Factory Act of 1934. In 1988 the movement which had started with brick kiln workers was extended to incorporate all other bonded labourers, with the establishment of the Bonded Labour Liberation Front (BLLF). However, the concerns of the brick kiln workers remained at the centre of the BLLF's activities. In 1988 a petition from a group of brick kiln workers led to an all-important ruling by the Supreme Court which, drawing on article 11 of the Constitution, pronounced bonded labour unconstitutional and banned it. The ruling obliged the Government to change the law. A draft bill prepared in 1989 eventually became law in March 1992 as the Bonded Labour System (Abolition) Act.

(b) The 1992 Act was initially applauded by human rights activists and campaigners against bonded labour in Pakistan. It abolished the "bonded labour system", that is the practices and traditions associated with peshgi, in particular the expectation that anyone who had accepted an advance was obliged to work until it was paid off (section 4 of the Act). It stated that anyone working as a bonded labourer was no longer under an obligation to repay any part of their bonded debt (section 6). It introduced a punishment (either a fine or two to five years' imprisonment or both) for anyone who enforced a bonded debt in the future by making a debtor work for them (section 11), and the same penalty for anyone making a member of their own family work as a bonded labourer (for example, parents who accept a loan in return for pledging their child to work for someone else). In these respects the new Act did not go much further than previous laws, such as the 1933 Act banning the pledging of children, which had failed in their objectives and fallen into abeyance.

(c) However, following the example of a 1976 law against bonded labour in a neighbouring country, the new Act also included provisions which were intended to ensure that it was implemented. Under section 9, the Government was to confer on district magistrates the power to "ensure that the provisions of the Act are properly carried out", in particular to "try and promote the welfare of the freed bonded labourer by securing and protecting the economic interests of such bonded labourer" (section 10). District magistrates, in practice the government-appointed heads of district-level administrations, were given key responsibilities both to investigate whether there were bonded labourers working in the area for which they were responsible, and, if there were, to take action to guarantee their release and rehabilitation.

(d) Again modelled on the same example, section 15 of the Act provided for the establishment of "vigilance committees" in every district in the country to support the district magistrate and district administration in their efforts to identify, free and rehabilitate bonded labourers. Composed of prominent people in each district, both government officials and others such as lawyers and journalists, the committees are supposed to advise on the application of the law generally, and in particular to help in the rehabilitation of freed bonded labourers and provide them with assistance. The Act provides for vigilance committees to include "representatives of the district administration, bar associations, press, recognized social services and labour departments of the federal and provincial Governments." In these respects then, the 1992 Act was significantly more proactive than any previous legislation against debt bondage involving either adults or children in Pakistan. If implemented, the new law would provide a framework for action at local level to eradicate this form of human rights violation and to prevent its re-establishment.

(e) According to the same report, for three years after the adoption of the Bonded Labour System (Abolition) Act, the Government took no steps to enforce the Act. However, in July 1995 the federal Government (in the form of the Ministry of Labour, Manpower and Overseas Pakistanis) issued a set of rules: these were provided for by section 21 of the 1992 Act "for carrying out the purposes" of the Act. This was the first of a set of critical steps which the central Government had to take to ensure that the law against bonded labour was enforced. In Pakistan, the publication of the rules in the Government Gazette did not attract public attention, However, the fact that they were issued means that at provincial and district level, officials can start enforcing some of the provisions of the 1992 Act if they want to.

(f) The July 1995 rules instruct provincial Governments to delegate to district magistrates some of the powers contained in the Bonded Labour System (Abolition) Act, in particular the power to carry out inspections of places where bonded labourers are suspected to be working and other investigations into reports of bonded labour (Rule 4). They also instruct provincial governments to tell district magistrates to set up vigilance committees under the terms of section 15 of the 1992 Act (rule 6).

(g) In contrast to the Act itself, the rules are much more specific about who should be a member of vigilance committees, and rule 6 identifies 18 categories of persons to belong to each committee. Most are closely linked to the authorities themselves, such as a retired judge, a senior police officer, a member of the Provincial Assembly, and representatives of government departments dealing with labour, agriculture and education. However, there is also provision for representatives of a "recognized body of workers" (a trade union), and of "a registered or recognized NGO" (non-governmental organization) working for the protection of human rights and also for a journalist with "experience of working in the field of human rights". Normally such individuals could be expected to be quite independent of the local authorities controlling a district, but this is not guaranteed by the rules, as they provide for these individuals to be nominated by local or central government officials. Furthermore, the provision that there should be only one representative of a trade union or other organization representing workers means that the local elite are intended to completely dominate each vigilance committee.

(h) In contrast to the July 1995 rules, adopted in Pakistan under the 1992 Act, the rules governing the implementation of the corresponding legislation made in 1976 in a neighbouring country not only contained details on vigilance committee membership but also specified how to implement the new law by issuing release certificates to freed bonded labourers and by keeping a register containing personal details of all those released. They also gave guidance on the crucial process of rehabilitation, without which most released bonded labourers would remain under such pressure that they would be likely to take new loans and return to bondage within a short time.

(i) The shortcomings of the July 1995 rules lie particularly in their weak provisions for the rehabilitation of released bonded labourers. Rule 9 concerns the "establishment of the fund" which is "for the rehabilitation and welfare of the freed bonded labourer". This is to consist of initial contributions which the federal or provincial Governments may make, along with any contributions by national or international organizations. In practice, the Government does not seem to have allocated any money in recent budgets for this use, and it seems that in practice no resources have been identified to pay for any form of rehabilitation - in contrast to the specific sums of money, albeit limited, which have been provided for the rehabilitation of some child labourers. It is also notable that, in contrast to the rules issued elsewhere, the rules issued in Pakistan in 1995 do not give district officials any guidance about release procedures nor do they provide for any formal process for registering the personal details of bonded labourers being freed, together with any sums of money they receive for rehabilitation. This means that no statistics are being collected on how many releases or cases of rehabilitation are occurring; therefore the Government has no accurate information to measure the success or failure of the law in terms of numbers of releases and cases of rehabilitation.

(j) The report concludes that if implemented at district level, the rules issued in July 1995 could help secure the release of significant numbers of bonded labourers. However, by issuing the rules with no publicity, and at a time when the Bonded Labour Liberation Front (BLLF), the principal non-governmental organization representing bonded labourers was being subjected to a series of repressive measures by the Government's own security agencies, the authorities effectively ensured that officials at provincial and district level would do little or nothing to implement them.

The Committee takes due note of these indications. It notes that the allegations of poor publicity and attention given to the law by the authorities correspond to the absence of any information on the July 1995 rules from the Government's report of November 1995 and statement to the Conference of June 1996, as well as from the Government's latest report on the observance of the Convention, which covers the period 1 July 1994 to 30 June 1996.

6. Challenges to the law. According to the report on debt bondage in Pakistan made by Anti-Slavery International and communicated by the NZCTU in June 1996, the 1992 law abolishing bonded labour was swiftly condemned by businessmen employing bonded labourers, who stood to lose money they had advanced in peshgi loan, and chose to challenge the new law before the country's Shariat (Islamic law) courts, claiming that the provisions freeing bonded labourers from their obligation to repay loans (contained in sections 6 and 8 of the Act) were "un-Islamic". One of the first challenges to the new law was filed with the Federal Shariat Court in September 1992 by a brick kiln owner, Ghulam Khana Bangash. The Court is not known to have yet issued a definitive ruling in response to this or other challenges, and employers take advantage of this to allege that the law does not yet have to be implemented. The Committee hopes that the Government will comment on these allegations and send a copy of the court ruling as soon as it is issued.

Fact-finding and law enforcement practice

7. In its reports for 1992-94 on the application of the Convention, the Government indicated that only one case of bonded labour was found, in the Punjab Province, and that the management was stated to have been prosecuted. In the "Consolidated position of the implementation of the Employment of Children Act, 1991, and the Bonded Labour System (Abolition) Act, 1992", received from the Government in November 1995, the number of inspections, prosecutions and convictions given for the Bonded Labour System (Abolition) Act, 1992, are all nil for each of the four provinces. It was stated by way of explanation that reports furnished by district magistrates from Baluchistan showed no instance of bonded labour in the province and that vigilance committees headed by the deputy commissioners in the districts of North-West Frontier Province (NWFP) and Sindh had detected no case of bonded labour; for Punjab, it was explained that in accordance with section 15 of the Act, vigilance committees had been formed in almost all the districts of Punjab, that the Act mainly envisaged an advisory and supervisory role for the vigilance committees, and "that it is a matter of general observation that aggrieved persons do not approach the vigilance committees but instead they prefer to invoke the jurisdiction of the High Court for prompt relief". In this regard, the Committee pointed out in its previous observation that under section 15 of the Act, vigilance committees to be set up at the district level are not only to advise the district administration on matters relating to the effective implementation of the law, but also to ensure its implementation in a proper manner and to provide the bonded labourers such assistance as may be necessary to achieve the objectives of the law; it did not appear that this had so far been done.

8. The Committee notes the indication given by a Government representative in 1996 to the Conference Committee that, while only one case of bonded labour had been identified for the whole country between 1992 and 1994, since 1995, so-called private jails had been raided: on 17 November 1995 in the District of Sanghar, where 96 detainees were released and a case under section 11 of the 1992 Act was registered against the offender; another "private" jail in the District of Umerkot was raided twice on 1 June 1995 and 14 January 1996, resulting in the release of 70 detainees. Cases were registered against 11 accused, of which two had been arrested while the remainder obtained bail before arrest from the High Court of Sindh and the Sessions Court, Umerkot. Yet another raid was conducted in the District of Umerkot by the Subdivisional Magistrate and Deputy Superintendent of Police, releasing ten peasant families, and a case had duly been registered against the accused. In the other four cases no evidence of bonded labour could be found on the premises alleged to be housing bonded labourers. The Government representative believed that the above-mentioned efforts by the Government were ample evidence of the Government's serious commitment to come to grips with the problem of children in bondage and with bonded labour. Admitting that the Government had not been able to eliminate the problem fully, he assured that it was moving in the right direction and that results would be seen in a few years.

9. In its latest report, covering the period from 1 July 1994 to 30 June 1996, the Government indicates that the enforceability and effective implementation of the Bonded Labour System (Abolition) Act 1992 is envisaged through the setting up of vigilance committees comprising the elected representatives, members of the bar associations, journalists, district administration and NGOs, and that these committees have already been set up in the Punjab, Sindh, NWFP and Baluchistan. In the provinces, the implementation and enforcement of the Act is entrusted to the district Magistrates, who are also chairmen of the district vigilance committees, are allowed to monitor and report violations and are vigilantly taking care of the implementation of the Act. The Government states that, as a result of the enactment of the Bonded Labour System (Abolition) Act 1992, bonded child labour has also been curbed in principle, wherever it exists, and that the implementation of the Act is being pursued vigorously by the provincial governments. Under the enactment all the four provincial governments have appointed inspectors who visit regularly industrial and commercial undertakings within their jurisdiction for the purpose of securing compliance.

10. The Government adds that the implementation position of the Act as reported by the four provincial governments is as follows: in Punjab, 329 raids were conducted, while the number of labourers recovered was 172. In Sindh, up to August 1996, there were 20 inspections/raids, the number of labourers recovered was 335, 11 cases were registered and 16 persons arrested (all released by the Court), and the number of convictions was nil. For NWFP and Baluchistan, the only indication is that no bonded labour case was reported.

11. The Committee takes due note of these indications. It also notes that the 1996 report on debt bondage in Pakistan made by Anti-Slavery International and communicated by the NZCTU contains the following detailed observations concerning the enforcement of the law.

(a) In order for the 1992 Bonded Labour System (Abolition) Act to have a substantial impact in Pakistan, the Government had to make its provisions widely known and then empower district magistrates to take action to guarantee the release and rehabilitation of bonded labourers. District magistrates are not, as their title might suggest, members of the judiciary, but are in fact the Government's representatives (deputy commissioners) in the districts where they are based. They take orders from within their own hierarchy and usually wait for instructions to be handed down before initiating any action. Section 9 of the Act requires provincial governments to confer these powers on district magistrates. However, provincial governments in their turn tend to await instructions from the Federal Government, which was given power to "make rules for carrying out the purposes" of the Act by section 21, but only did so in July 1995. Now that a set of rules has been issued, it is important that the Government should follow up rapidly by instructing district magistrates to transform the rules into action.

(b) District magistrates are not the only officials who are expected to enforce the Act. Section 15 provides for the establishment of vigilance committees "in the prescribed manner". Because there was a three-year delay before the Government indicated "in the prescribed manner" to set up committees, very few were established. There have been reports that in some districts where vigilance committees have been appointed, their members include businessmen who are still employing bonded labourers.

(c) The first substantial evidence of the extent to which the Act was not being implemented came at the end of 1993, when the Supreme Court again inquired into a report of bonded labour, this time in the carpet industry. In November 1993, a lawyer, Anwar Sadiq, accompanied by several foreign human rights activists and a local magistrate, visited a carpet factory near Kasur where 300 children were reported to be working, in order to expose breaches of the law and bring about the children's release. Anwar Sadiq was subsequently subjected to threats and his brother was arrested. In protest at both the employment of children and the harassment of the lawyer, two people in Sweden wrote to Pakistan's Supreme Court to draw the Court's attention to the abuses. As in 1988, the Supreme Court decided to treat the communication as a constitutional petition (Case 3-L of 1993) and required the Kasur district magistrate, the local labour department and the Punjab Social Welfare Department to submit information about what was going on. The responses received at the beginning of 1994 revealed that the 1992 Bonded Labour System (Abolition) Act remained virtually unimplemented: The labour department said that district administrations in Punjab had been instructed in August 1993, 17 months after the Act was passed, to set up vigilance committees. However, the Kasur district magistrate was quite categorical that none had been set up in Kasur. He also observed that the 1992 Act had received little publicity. He said its provisions were consequently unknown and neither employers nor employees were aware that peshgi did not have to be repaid. He also questioned the very basis of the 1992 Act, claiming that it did not command popular support. He knew that no court magistrate had been empowered to try offences committed under the Act and that no rules had been prepared about how to implement the Act. He was not ready to take action himself to ensure the release and rehabilitation of bonded labourers as required under section 10 of the Act.

The Punjab Social Welfare Department told the Supreme Court that it was in no way responsible for implementing the law against bonded labour, although the Act requires it to be involved in vigilance committees. The Labour Department indicated that it was concerned primarily with the implementation of the 1991 Employment of Children Act. Although the Supreme Court received this information from officials at the beginning of 1994, it seems to have taken no further action in the case to insist that the authorities enforce the 1992 Act, although it was clear that the law was being disregarded.

(d) In Kasur District, as in others where inquiries were made on behalf of Anti-Slavery International at the beginning of 1995, the head of the local bar association had never heard or been told that the bar Association should be part of a vigilance committee. Other districts where Anti-Slavery International received confirmation during the first half of 1995 that lawyers had no information about the establishment of vigilance committees include Gujrat, Lahore and Sheikhupura Districts.

(e) Elsewhere in the country, there has been even more recent evidence that vigilance committees have not been set up. In North West Frontier Province, the provincial labour department was reported during the first half of 1995 to be convening a committee at provincial level composed of four provincial government officials, 11 representatives of the Brick Kiln Owners' Association and five representatives of the Brick Kiln Workers' Union. By the end of April 1995 it had not met. At district level, some district magistrates were reported to have convened vigilance committees, but this had evidently been left to the initiative of individuals rather than being done systematically.

(f) The report concludes that:

- Local government officials have not been obliged to implement the Bonded Labour System (Abolition) Act.

- Few vigilance committees have been established in the districts and, when they have been, their composition does not conform either to the letter or to the spirit of the law.

- There is no system for monitoring the occurrence of bonded labour or the number of releases of bonded workers.

- Judges have not been given powers to prosecute employers who continue to offer advances for bonded labour.

- Some 2,000 cases lodged by bonded labourers under the Bonded Labour System (Abolition) Act between March 1992 and early 1995 were turned down by the courts on the grounds that they did not have jurisdiction - because the Government had not implemented sections 9 and 16 of the Bonded Labour System (Abolition) Act. Over the same period, about 250 cases are reported to have been filed by bonded labourers with labour courts, although it is not known how these have progressed.

12. The Committee has taken note of these detailed allegations, which have remained without a reply and are matched by the limited scope and results of concrete action reported by the Government, as reflected in points 7 to 10 above. The Committee recalls the observation on the application of the Convention made by the All Pakistan Federation of United Trade Unions in a communication dated 31 December 1993 (which was transmitted to the Government for comments and also remained without reply) that the feudals of the country had a strong hold over the administrative machinery, which was always used for the protection of the bonded labour system, and whenever any effort was made to eliminate this system, it was strongly resisted. The Committee further notes that in its communication of June 1996, the NZCTU has stressed the Workers' members' concern at the Conference Committee in June 1996 that the Government was putting more energy into attacking those, such as the BLLF, who seek to free bonded labourers, than into implementing the laws which purport to ban such labour.

Action to be taken

13. The Committee notes from the communication made by the NZCTU that, on the basis of the failings noted, the NZCTU concludes with Anti-Slavery International that the following action is required to implement the Bonded Labour System (Abolition) Act:

(a) The central Government should insist that all provincial governments take action to implement sections 9 and 10 of the Act, that is "to confer such powers and impose such duties" on district magistrates as are needed to allow the Act to be carried out.

(b) Central Government should require each provincial government to empower one or more magistrates to try offences committed under the Act, as required by section 16 of the Act.

(c) In order to ensure implementation of the 1992 Act and the 1995 rules, central Government should instruct provincial governments to establish vigilance committees in every district within a specified time limit, and monitor the initial sessions of committees in order to ensure that their meetings take place in practice as well as in theory.

(d) Central Government should ensure that, at provincial level, budgets are established to pay for rehabilitation. Appropriate resources should be made available for such budgets, along with appropriate controls to ensure that resources are not misused.

(e) The rules or other instructions for implementation of the 1992 Act should be revised or supplemented to indicate the following:

(i) District magistrates should be given guidelines relating to the release of bonded labourers. In particular, the rules should provide for a register to be kept recording the personal details of all bonded labourers who are released, together with details of their rehabilitation. This would allow government at both provincial and national level to monitor the process of releases and issue factual information about the numbers of releases actually taking place.

(ii) As both the 1992 Act and the 1995 rules indicate who should be members of vigilance committees, and there have nevertheless been reports that some of the committees already set up have included prominent local people who actually employ bonded labour, it would be appropriate for the rules to be revised to indicate that no person who might be employing bonded labourers should be appointed to a vigilance committee.

(iii) District magistrates and vigilance committees should be given a clearer idea of what actions they are expected to undertake in order to investigate whether any labourers in their district are victims of debt bondage, in particular the minimum actions acceptable. Evidently, this should make clear that it is not sufficient to wait for bonded labourers to register complaints about their status, or simply to ask individual workers if they are bonded or not: in both cases they are likely to feel so intimidated that they do not reveal their bonded status.

(iv) It should also be made clearer what minimum steps are to be taken by district magistrates or vigilance committees to rehabilitate bonded labourers who are freed (section 10 of the Act says district-level officials "shall as far as practicable, try to promote the welfare of the freed bonded labourer so that he may not have any occasion or reason to contract any further bonded debt").

14. According to the same communication from the NZCTU, supplementary actions required to make the Bonded Labour System (Abolition) Act effective include:

(a) Publicity. This did not change with the publication in July 1995 of the rules governing the implementation of the Act, for this appears to have received little publicity or attention from the government officials concerned. It is therefore vital that the Government effectively relaunch the law with a campaign of public information designed to bring it to the attention of employers and employees alike. Many employers of bonded labour do not recognize that they are committing either an offence against the law or an abuse of human rights - indeed, they often say that by giving advances they are giving charity and bringing benefits to those poorer than themselves. The public information campaign must therefore deal with popular attitudes, as well as giving purely technical information about the provisions of law.

(b) An integrated programme of legal and social action. Challenges to the 1992 Act before the Shariat Courts should be dealt with rapidly, so that pending cases can no longer be cited as an excuse to delay implementation of the law. Even if the Bonded Labour System (Abolition) Act is implemented fully, a series of programmes should be run at the same time to help those released from bondage, and their families, to develop alternative livelihoods. This is particularly relevant for children, for whom appropriate primary education should be provided. It is clear from experience in other countries that district magistrates and vigilance committees are not likely to be able to meet this challenge without support and funding from the Government.

(c) Ending harassment and repression of activists. From the beginning of June 1995 onwards, activists campaigning against bonded labour in Pakistan were victims of a series of arrests and indictments by the authorities, in particular the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA), Pakistan's security agency. The leader of the main organization campaigning against bonded labour, Ehsan Ullah Khan of the Bonded Labour Liberation Front (BLLF), was accused of being a spy for a neighbouring State while he was out of the country and has remained abroad in order to avoid arrest. Whatever the possible reasons or justification for these acts of repression, the public message which the Government conveyed was that campaigning against bonded labour was against the public interest and likely to result in punishment. The Government must now reverse its policy of "punishing the messenger" and commit itself to supporting those in Pakistan who, like the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan and the Bonded Labour Liberation Front, have campaigned publicly for the end of debt bondage.

15. The Committee has taken note of the allegations and conclusions communicated by the NZCTU in its comments on the application of the Convention. It hopes that the Government will supply detailed observations on the allegations made, as well as indications on any action taken or envisaged that would correspond to the recommendations set out in points 13 and 14 above.

16. The Committee again expresses the hope that the necessary measures will be taken to ensure the effective enforcement of the Bonded Labour System (Abolition) Act, 1992, as regards the identification, release and rehabilitation of bonded labourers as well as the strict punishment of offenders, including, as provided for under section 14 of the Act and section 107 of the Penal Code, the punishment of any public officer or other person who, by any act, illegal omission or wilful concealment of a material fact which he is bound to disclose, voluntarily aids or procures an offence to be committed under the Act. The Committee requests the Government to supply full details on the action taken to this effect, on any measures taken under the 1995 rules to effectively include at the district and local levels representatives of trade unions and employers' associations in the machinery, as well as representatives of the National Human Rights Commission, the Bonded Labour Liberation Front and any other non-governmental organizations engaged in the task of assisting the bonded labourers, and on the results obtained, including the numbers of bonded labourers identified, freed and rehabilitated, and details concerning the prosecution, conviction and punishment of offenders, in the cases referred to in points 8 and 10 above and any further cases registered.

II. Child labour beyond bonded labour

17. In its report for the period 1994-96 the Government has supplied detailed information on action taken to deal with the problem of child labour, including the setting up of various specialized committees and administrative bodies; the accomplishment of a national survey of child labour; the commitment to providing primary education to all children: the setting up of 17 multipurpose centres for working children, including 14 at brick kilns, which provide non-formal education, religious education and recreation to a total of 500 children; the launching of a national project for 35 rehabilitation centres for working children; the planning of an awareness-raising campaign, and, last but not least, the initiation, in cooperation with the ILO, of 13 Action Programmes under the International Programme for the Elimination of Child Labour (IPEC) during 1994-95.

18. The Committee has noted these indications with interest. It notes that some of the programmes and projects mentioned by the Government concern children in bondage or in industries with a high incidence of bonded labour. For forms of child labour other than bonded labour, the Committee had, in its previous observation, raised the question, with regard to Article 2(1) of the Convention, whether, and if so, under what circumstances a minor can be considered to have offered himself "voluntarily" for work or service, whether or when the consent of the parents is needed or even sufficient in this regard, and what are the sanctions for refusal. Referring also to its observation under the Minimum Age (Industry) (Revised) Convention, 1937 (No. 59), the Committee hopes that the Government will soon be in a position to report progress and concrete results for the various programmes and projects aimed at the elimination of child labour.

III. Restrictions on termination of employment

19. The Committee has been commenting for a considerable number of years on the provisions of the Pakistan Essential Services (Maintenance) Act, 1952, rendering punishable with imprisonment of up to one year a person in employment of whatever nature under the federal Government who terminates his employment without the consent of his employer, notwithstanding any express or implied term in his contract providing for termination with notice. These provisions may be extended to other classes of employment (sections 2, 3(1)(b) and explanation 2, section 7(1); section 3). Similar provisions are contained in the West Pakistan Essential Services (Maintenance) Act, 1958, as in force in Baluchistan and the North-West Frontier Province, and in the corresponding Punjab and Sindh Essential Services (Maintenance) Acts of 1958.

20. The Government has repeatedly indicated its intention to amend the provisions of the Pakistan Essential Services (Maintenance) Act so that an employee may terminate his employment in accordance with the express or implied terms of his contract. In its report for the period 1993-94, received 30 May 1995, as well as in its latest report, the Government has stated that the Act is made applicable temporarily to essential employments only for the purpose of securing the defence or security of the country and for the maintenance of supplies and services, essential to the life of the community. The Government adds that the list of essential employments covered under the law is minimum, and that the Government has adopted a policy of constant review and check of this list. In a statement to the Conference Committee in June 1996, a Government representative indicated that the scope of the Essential Services Act had been further reduced. Compared to nine establishments or categories covered in 1995, the Act was applicable at the present in the following categories having a strong bearing on the security of the country and the life of the community: (i) employment in connection with the generation, transmission, distribution and supply of electricity; (ii) employment under the specified oil and gas organizations whose number had been reduced from 17 to nine; (iii) employment under the Pakistan Security Printing Corporation and Security Papers Ltd.; (iv) employment under Kahuta Research Laboratories; (v) employment under the Civil Aviation Authority; (vi) employment under Karachi Electricity Supply Corporation; (vii) Karachi Port Trust and Port Qasim Authority.

21. The Committee has taken due note of these indications. As regards the Government's repeated statement that the Act is made applicable temporarily to limited categories of employment only, the Committee is bound to point out once more that the Essential Services Acts apply permanently to all employment of whatever nature under the federal Government, and to all employment under a provincial government or any agency set up by it or a local authority or any service relating to transport or civil defence; in addition, they may be applied, by notification of a provincial government, to employment in any educational autonomous body, and by notification of the federal Government for specific and renewable periods of six months each to other employment or classes of employment which the Government considers essential.

22. In its report received 30 May 1995, the Government further stated with regard to employment under the Pakistan Essential Services (Maintenance) Act that, while the right of association in such cases remained intact, only strikes and lockouts were prohibited because the Government felt that if essential services are disrupted, the life of the community as a whole will be in danger. However, in all circumstances, the workers' right to resort to "an appropriate forum (NIRC) for redressal of their grievances" was available to them. The Government added that it had also deliberated to amend the provisions of this law in order to enable an employee to terminate his employment in accordance with expressed or implied terms of employment, but reiterated that the application of this law to some industries was inevitable in view of the sensitivity of their employments. Moreover, this had been done because national interest demanded suitable checks and balances in these cases. The Government nevertheless had decided that the law in question should not in future be extended to any industry unless it was fully warranted and justified. However, the possibility for employees covered by the Essential Services (Maintenance) Act, 1952, to unilaterally terminate their employment and the exclusion of some of the establishments from the application of the Act had been considered by the tripartite Task Force on Labour, which submitted its report to the Cabinet in the light of the views expressed by the workers' and employers' groups. The Cabinet constituted a Cabinet Committee to further examine the report, and the ILO would be informed of developments in the matter. In its most recent report, received 18 months later, the Government repeats the same indications, adding that the recommendations of the task forces are under active consideration and that information on the latest developments will be supplied as and when the new labour policy is announced by the Government.

23. The Committee notes the absence of visible progress in restoring the right of employees covered by the Essential Services (Maintenance) Act, 1952, to unilaterally terminate their employment. As regards the Government's indication that the right of association remains intact and only strikes and lockouts are prohibited, the Committee, referring also to point 3 of its observation on Pakistan under the Abolition of Forced Labour Convention, 1957 (No. 105), must once again point out that even in truly essential services, whose interruption might endanger the life, personal safety or health of persons, the freedom of individual workers to terminate their employment by giving notice of reasonable length remains an inalienable right; under the federal and provincial Essential Services Acts, this right is being denied to a far wider group of employees. The Committee recalls that the Essential Services Acts have been the subject of comments for a great number of years under the Convention, ratified by Pakistan in 1957, and that the Government had assured the Conference Committee in 1989 that the Government had already decided to meet the requirements of the Convention by amending the 1952 Act, and that the proposed amendment was to be submitted to the National Assembly. Recalling also the observation by the All Pakistan Federation of Trade Unions, in its communication dated 13 October 1994, that these laws are required to be abolished in the light of Conventions Nos. 105 and 29, ratified by Pakistan, and noting the firm hope expressed by the Conference Committee in 1996 that the Government would take every measure in the very near future to ensure that both the national and provincial legislation on essential services was amended in order to eliminate restrictions on the freedom of workers to leave their employment, the Committee hopes that this will at last be done and that the Government will soon be in a position to supply a copy of the legislation adopted to this end.

[The Government is asked to supply full particulars to the Conference at its 85th Session and to report in detail in 1997.]