The National Industrial Relations Commission (NIRC), the apex judicial body of the country, has almost been non-functional as the government is unable to appoint its Chairman and other members, Business Recorder reliably learnt here on Thursday.
The Commission was established in 1973 by the then government of Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto to settle industrial disputes between workers and employers, now looks like a powerless body.
The judicial body has been working without Chairman and its members for the last one year.
An official source in the Ministry of Labour told this scribe that once the NIRC was the powerful organ, entertaining suppressed workers and trade unions but now it was unable to provide relief as the Federal government had withdrawn its powers in the amended Industrial Relations Ordinance (IRO) 2002.
The NIRC, which was the highest judicial body to register labour unions and determine collective bargaining agents, is facing hardships in disposing off pending cases in the absence of the Chairman and members, sources added.
The commission comprises eight judges, including a Chairman whose office has been lying vacant since a year or so.
Slots of member judges, which fall vacant from time to time due to retirement or completion of tenure, have not been filled.
Sources in the Ministry of Labour revealed that Prime Minister Zafarullah Jamali has given the approval of new Chairman of NIRC and five other members of the body.
It has been learnt that Justice Tanveer Ahmed Khan, the retired Supreme Court Judge, will assume the charge as new chairman of 8-member commission by end of this week. However, the names of other members were not available.
It is being observed that representatives of workers and trade unions are seen in the commission's premises running from pillar to post to get relief.
Nearly 2000 cases of different nature are lying pending with the NIRC, sources said.
The representatives of workers federation have been demanding of the Ministry of Labour to look into the matter seriously to protect the workers interests. Even the said Ministry has been without a Minister after the demise of Abdul Sattar Laleka.
Talking to Business Recorder, the workers' representatives strongly criticised the new IRO 2002, alleging it to be intentionally carved to weaken the power of NIRC.
The new law has also violated the 1973 constitution's provision on fundamental rights as it curtailed the NIRC powers for grant of relief to workers, they added.
The Commission so far decided 33,000 cases but most of them remained unimplemented. Under the new Ordinance, the commission has only the right to give capital punishment.
Certain legal amendments introduced by the previous government barred bank employees from forming trade unions. The addition of Section 27-B in the Banking Companies Ordinance in 1998 took away the right to freedom of association in the banking sector.
In the same year, the Service Tribunal Act was amended to add Section 2-A to debar government and semi-government employees from seeking legal relief from the labour courts.