Lives lost to corruption and apathy

Yet another man-made disaster in Bangladesh, yet another familiar chain of events. The collapse of the Rana Plaza garment factory on the outskirts of Dhaka, which killed around 600 workers, and injured thousands, is the latest in the long line of preventable tragedies that cause deaths, injuries, tears, rage, finger-pointing and hullabaloo in the media. If the past is any indicator, it will quieten down in a while. Soon, it will be back to business as usual, except for those whose lives and livelihoods got smashed when the building collapsed.

But the tragic incident should not be seen as just another disaster in a disaster-prone country. For middle class India, which sees itself as denizens of an emerging economic power, the Rana Plaza building collapse offers important lessons.

First, corruption kills. Literally. Shady deals are not just about bags full of money being exchanged.

In their current form, they are weakening the society’s immune system, triggering a cascade of
collapses — buildings and institutions.

Second, safety costs money, and safety is not a first-world issue. If we buy the argument that in a rapidly globalizing world, poor countries or emerging powers on a growth path cannot afford to be fussy about issues like safety, we should also accept that the price of such growth will be paid in human lives.

Third, safety is a non-negotiable issue and everyone’s responsibility. But it will not become so magically or through mere legislation, unless there is a huge pressure from the bottom, the most at risk, and unless it becomes a political issue. This is what history shows, including the history of developed countries.

Preliminary results of a government inquiry into the collapse of the eight-storey Rana Plaza building show use of sub-standard materials during construction. The lead investigator has blamed vibrations from four illegally positioned generators for the collapse of the building. When these generators started after a power outage, they created vibrations, and together with the vibration of thousands of sewing machines, they led to the collapse. The building could not withstand the vibrations because sub-standard rods, bricks and other material had been used during construction. Last November, Bangladesh suffered another workplace tragedy — a horrific factory fire when 112 workers were burned alive in a building with no fire exits.

There are hundreds of factories in Bangladesh which have come up in recent years to cope with the voracious appetite for cheap clothes in the Western world. Many flout basic, safety regulations.

This, however, is not a uniquely Bangladeshi challenge. Many buildings in rapidly urbanizing India also do not conform to safety regulations. And it is not just a workplace issue. That this happens because there is collusion between those who are tasked to point out the lapses, and those committing the lapses, is well-known.

Last month alone, there were two telling illustrations of the nexus between callousness, corruption and casualties. The ceiling of a hospital in Bhopal collapsed, killing three persons and injuring more than two dozen. A building in Mumbra, suburban Thane, also collapsed, killing more than 70 people, including children.

The latter is a national news story. Media reports suggest a familiar trail — poor quality building material had been used; while the district building code requires that blueprints are filed and approved by municipal agencies and permits are obtained to connect electricity, water and sewage services, the builders did not file the blueprints in this case. All this was conveniently overlooked. Some builders, engineers, municipal officials have been arrested. But it remains to be seen how this story pans out eventually.

What should we do? It is pointed out that the garment industry accounts for 77 per cent of Bangladesh’s exports. Can she afford to fight back, without endangering jobs and livelihood? Yes, she can, and she should. So should every country, including India. And the issue is not merely one of rich country corporates and workers in poor countries.

Companies and contractors have to be compelled to take responsibility for building and workplace safety. But regulatory agencies must equally take the rap each time there is a safety lapse. This will happen only if communities remain vigilant.

This is not a new or revolutionary insight. This is how the rich world built its safety system.

In a recent article titled What Bangladesh Can Learn from New York’s Triangle Factory Fire in Time  magazine, David Von Drehle points out that “A little more than a century ago, in the rapidly developing United States of America, nearly 1,000 workers died on the job every week, on average.”

The tipping point was the death of 146 garment workers in New York’s infamous Triangle Fire on a warm spring day in 1911.

Since then, the number of workplace fatalities has reduced by more than 90 per cent, though the US population has more than tripled. How did this happen? The changes took place not because of a sudden gush of humanitarian concern for the workers but because of political willpower. As Von Drehle notes, “In the years leading up to the fire, several rising forces took aim at the corrupt political machinery of New York, known as Tammany Hall. At the upper levels of society, there was the reform movement known as Progressivism. This movement overlapped with the surging women’s suffrage campaign. A more uneasy alliance joined both of these with the burgeoning labor movement.”

The Triangle Fire propelled prominent individuals with political ambitions to take up the cause of workplace safety. As their stars rose in national politics, their ‘cause’ became the Democratic Party’s cause, and from there, it became a shared national priority in the United States.  This is something which not only Bangladesh but also India can learn from.

The author is a Delhi-based writer.