The government has fixed minimum monthly wages for the workers of cotton textile industry, making a little change in basic pay and house rent from the proposed ones.
The Ministry of Labour and Employment (MoLE) on April 04 issued a gazette notification announcing Tk 10,001 as gross monthly minimum wage for the country's cotton textile sector workers. The amount earlier which was Tk 5,710 set in 2018.
According to the gazette notification, the newly announced wages will take retrospective effect from March 1, 2024.
Earlier, the minimum wage board formed for the sector in January this year finalised its proposal recommending Tk 10,000 as minimum wage.
According to it, a grade-10 worker would receive Tk 10,001 as minimum monthly wage - basic pay of Tk 5,162 for upazila town areas, 55 per cent of the basic pay (Tk 2,839) as house rent, Tk 750 as medical allowance, Tk 400 as travel allowance and Tk 850 as food allowance.
Grade-10 workers in the district towns and divisional cities would receive house rents at the rate of 60 per cent and 70 per cent respectively of the basic pay.
Earlier, the minimum wage board recommended the minimum wage at Tk 10,000 - Tk 5,000 as basic pay, 60 per cent of the basic pay (Tk 3,000) as house rent for the upazila town, Tk 750 as medical allowance, Tk 400 as travel allowance and Tk 850 as food allowance.
It also proposed house rent at the rate of 65 per cent of basic pay for the district towns and 70 per cent for the divisional cities.
The MoLE reduced the rate of the house rent and slightly increased the basic pay from the proposal of the wage board but kept the gross amount almost unchanged.
According to the gazette, grade-nine workers would receive Tk 10,417 as minimum monthly wage, grade-eight workers Tk 10,643, and grade-seven workers Tk 10,962.
The minimum wage for grade six has been set at Tk 11,250, grade five at Tk 11, 570, grade four at Tk 11,889, grade three at Tk 12,723, grade two at Tk 13,250 and grade one at Tk 14,307 respectively.
The government has also set the same amount (Tk 10,001) as minimum pay for grade-six employees.
The labour ministry also announced Tk 7,503 as the monthly pay for both apprentice workers and employees doing six-month apprenticeship.
The basic pay is Tk 3,550 while the house rent is 55 per cent of the basic pay (Tk 1,953). On the other hand, Tk 750 is medical allowance, Tk 400 travel allowance and Tk 850 food allowance.
The wages would be applicable for all the textile mills across the country and both workers and employees would be entitled to a 5.0 per cent annual increment, according to the notification.
According to industry insiders, there are some 7,000 textile mills across the country creating employment for about 5.0 million people.
Earlier, the MoLE has fixed minimum wage for garment workers Tk 12,500 which came into effect from December 01 last year. The workers have been receiving salaries under the new structure from January this year.
munni_fe@yahoo.com