KARACHI: Veteran labour unionist Karamat Ali on Thursday morning died in Karachi after prolonged illness, his nephew Abbas Haider confirmed.

According to Haider, the joint director of the Pakistan Institute of Labour Education and Research (Piler), Ali was under treatment at a private hospital in Karachi.

His funeral prayers will be held at 7pm today at the Shuhada-i-Karbala Imambargah in Karachi’s Ancholi area, after which he will be laid to rest in the Wadi-i-Hussain Graveyard, Haider added.

Ali was one of the founding members of Piler and was serving as its executive director.

According to Piler’s website, Ali was also a founding member of “various local and regional networks like Pakistan Peace Coalition, Pakistan-India People’s Forum for Peace and Democracy and South Asia Labour Forum”.

The Karachi Literature Festival’s (KLF) website describes Ali, author of the book Raahguzar Tau Dekho, as having played an important role in the labour movement of the 1970s.

“Karamat Ali has been a key activist in the peace process between India and Pakistan and in the South Asian Region as a whole,” the KLF said, adding that he was “felicitated with the Didi Nirmala Deshpande South Asian Award for peace and justice in 2013”.