Death at construction sites

When workers meet their tragic end at construction sites, they make news but only briefly. The job is fraught with risks but it is made riskier by not following the required safety rules. In most cases the death of construction workers is avoidable. When a precariously dangling scaffold gets dislodged, a rope snaps and a newly laid roof crumbles, negligence on the part of all concerned is to blame. Mechanical devices backed up by enough safety measures and protective gears are available now to replace scaffolds and other makeshift supports fitted clumsily against high-rise buildings. When ropes snap due to wear and tear or extra weight, workers fall many stories to their death.

On Tuesday, three construction workers died falling off the 10th floor of a multi-storied building on Baily Road in the city. On May 25, another construction worker was killed in a similar accident in Maghbazar Wireless Gate area. Also, there were the earlier shocking and frightening accidents involving the collapse of flyover girders in Dhaka and Chittagong. There is a limit to callousness on the part of construction firms! Perhaps it is wrong to call such incidents mere accidents; actually these are plain murder. Development firms and/or construction companies cannot force workers to work at the outer walls on temporary scaffolds with no life-saving protective gears as a last resort. The way the three men - two of them in their teens and the third one in his mid-twenty - were working at the 10th level in a lift shaft of an underconstruction building was an open invitation to tragedy. And tragedy did befall them when the bamboo scaffold slipped and dislodged.

A mason or a paint worker who takes extreme risks at his work site may not be fully aware of the danger he is exposed to or his stinging poverty at home may compel him to overlook it. But it is the construction company which should meticulously check all the gears in order to ensure his safety at work. Not only do the majority of such construction companies not go for procurement of the modern safety devices, gears and implements but also ignore the required supervisions.

Even those responsible for such worksite supervision do not often possess enough expertise for the job. Lacking in education, they are not even adequately trained in the trade. In one such fatal accident at a multi-storied tower in the city's Dhanmondi, the supervisor stepped into what is called a buckhoist with full capacity and his extra weight was enough to trip the support on the roof. All the men in the buckhoist were thrown out. They fell on the roof of a two-storied building below. Perhaps, three of them died instantly and one succumbed to his injuries later on.

So, the problem is multi-dimensional. First, workers' lives are considered cheap because they are uneducated and are too eager to avoid grinding poverty. They have no time to think of the danger ahead, let alone insurance or any such policy in case workplace accidents bring an end to their lives. The construction companies, on their part, try to maximise their profit and are reluctant to procure construction machines and equipment. Driven by profit mentality, they at times ignore the basic safety rules and workers become the direct casualties of such cost-cutting mentality. Then, the companies and the educational institutions are yet to feel the need for developing specialised education and training for workplace safety.

True hazardous occupations are there everywhere but man has developed and is still developing advanced machines and gears to minimise the risks of accidents too. Admittedly, even in the most technologically advanced nations such accidents occur. But the number of casualties at workplaces there is very few. In countries like Bangladesh callousness reigns supreme especially when it comes to saving the lives of the poor, working people.

Some of the factory disasters in this country prompt one to go for strong arguments that workers are not well looked after here. The construction sector is just one area, where workers are not even united and have no association or organisation of their own. There seems to be no one taking up the case of these disorganised labourers. This is where it hurts most. Even the government seems to wash its hands off when such tragedies occur. At the time a portion of a floor of Rangs Bhaban (building or house) came crumbling down on workers during its dismantling, it killed about a dozen labourers. It happened during the reign of a caretaker government. Did the government pay compensation for the loss of lives? What about the victims of girder collapse? Although no compensation can be enough for loss of life, at least enough money should be paid to the families of the dead workers so that they can survive without their bread earners.

Thus the poor workers and their families are doubly victimised and deprived. No doubt that the mentality of treating human life so cheaply must go through a paradigm shift in the first place if there is any desire to improve the situation. Procurement of some basic instruments and devices must be made mandatory for developers and construction companies in order to avoid such accidents. At the level of supervision, required number of supervisors should be produced through specialised education and training. Construction workers should be brought under a general policy of insurance. No matter who a worker at any construction site is, if s/he becomes a casualty - irrespective of death or injuries, provision must be there for reasonable compensation.  

nilratanhalder2000@yahoo.com