Having spent the Christmas weekend in Doha, Qatar, the most evident feature of the city was the ever present labour workforce visible at the corner of every block, working silently under the Qatari sunlight like the stealthy stage hands who are instrumental in making any performance a successful production.
Doha in many ways is nothing more than just a global stage for the oil money to be splurged by the Emir of Qatar in making his own Legoland replete with mummed figurines coexisting in the background with towering skyscrapers built bit by bit after having exploited the lifespan of millions of hopeful labourers originating from south-east Asia.
According to BBC News in the News Report dated: 25 June, 2013 and titled: Qatari emir Hamad hands power to son Tamim:
“The Emir of the State of Qatar is the monarch and head of state of the country. The Emir is also the commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces and guarantor of the Constitution. The Emir holds the most powerful position in the country, and has a prominent role in foreign relations.”
The Emirs are members of the House of Al Thani, whose origins are in the Banu Tamim, one of the largest tribes in the Arabian Peninsula. The present ruler is Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, who succeeded on 25 June 2013.
According to the Ministry of Justice of the State of Qatar (2022): The permanent constitution of the state of Qatar published in 2005 dictates that the rule is hereditary and limited to descendants of Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani. The order of succession in Qatar would be determined by appointments within the House of Al Thani.
As per the website of the State of Qatar (2023) pertaining to the Amiri Diwan, it is the seat of rule of the State of Qatar. It is the sovereign body and the administrative office of HH The Amir. It acts as a nexus between His Highness and all governmental and non-governmental bodies internally and externally.
Among its manifold tasks and responsibilities, it keeps HH The Amir abreast of the most important developments locally and internationally, submits to him draft laws and other legislative instruments for perusal and approval, and delivers his instructions to the concerned authorities.
Interestingly, while I was personally interacting with many labourers who were engaged in the construction of roads in Doha, their brief interviews revealed that they would be paid minimal wages that were just above the Qatari minimum wage of $274 dollars per month. Most of the Labourer salaries in Doha average at the lower margin of the Minimum wage with virtually no provision being left for disposable income. The downside of the frugal labourer salaries in Doha is that the provision for welfare contributions towards future Pension is currently inexistent. A trend that is commonplace in all the GCC Countries when it comes to the employment of labourers who are usually contracted through third party contracts is that the concept of welfare contributions in the interest of the labourer’s welfare are non-existent.
Similarly, Gadkari is not very different from the Monarch of Qatar and he seemingly ought to be touted as the Emir of Goa and consequently the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways could be attributed as being likened to an Amiri Diwan. This metaphorical aphorism becomes an imperative necessity since a 100 Crores have been allocated to the State of Goa by the Minister of Road Transport and Highways for the purpose of mitigating black spots and to improve road safety overall in the State.
The process of utilisation of these newly allocated funds would undeniably be carried forth through the democratic process of announcing tenders through the respective departments pertaining to State Roads as well as the National Highways respectively. Rife with exploitative tendencies, the entire process of announcing tenders for the construction of goan roads would have to go down into history as one of the worst human rights breaches that the bureaucracy has ever engaged in.
The sight of poorly clad Maharashtrian families inclusive of ethnic women, who along with their young children are huddled up by the side of the ‘kachcha patri’ (road) while the male members are engaged in breaking down huge boulders of laterite rock while the others drop the aggregate gravel over the prepared road surface before coating the entire work with flaming hot tar.
While the above description can be prospectively viewed as the ‘tarakki’ (success) and ‘vikaas’ (development) which easily amalgamates with the overpromising mandate of every political hopeful, achieving the feat of development in the State of Goa can no longer compromise with the human rights of labourers who are employed by third party contractors and thereafter exploited due to their socio-economic vulnerability.
According to Asia Floor Wage (2021):
“The evolution of the jurisprudence in both the UK and US through various tests provides basis for the following:
n Unmasking of true employment relations: It allows true employment relations and resulting liability to be identified even where it is obfuscated as in the case of large companies which contract out production, and related hiring, supervision and payment of workers.
n Fixing responsibility on those who benefit from business: Responsibility towards workers is firmly placed on all persons and entities who ultimately benefit from the business by identifying with whom control and accumulation of profits takes place.”
In 2011, the United Nations Guiding Principles for Business and Human Rights were adopted which established the corporate responsibility to respect human rights and defined it as taking measures to “identify, prevent, mitigate, and account for how they address their impacts on human rights”.
Hence, it becomes imperative that the human rights of the labourers being engaged by the State of Goa for the purpose of construction of road safety infrastructure must be guaranteed through proper governmental welfare schemes and adequate provisions for the welfare of these labourers must be made against the evil days that they may face due to ill health, retrenchment and/or permananent disability incurred during the course of employment.
