At the heart of Bangladesh’s brick kiln industry lies a recruitment system that quietly sustains inhumane exploitation. Labour recruitment through the sardari system enables systematic abuse by insulating kiln owners from direct accountability through subcontracted hiring and supervision. Within this arrangement, sardars wield near-total control over workers’ schedules, movement, and discipline, frequently using violence, threats, and confinement to enforce compliance.
Informal loans taken during the lean agricultural season further entrap workers, as inflated repayment demands are imposed on those unable to complete the full season in brick kilns. Taken together, this debt-based recruitment mechanism closely resembles debt bondage, a recognised form of forced labour under international law. Alarmingly, such practices persist to this day in Bangladesh, particularly across brick kilns nationwide.
Brick kiln work in Bangladesh usually begins after the month of Ashwin (around October) and continues for about six months. At present, the season is at its midpoint, with kiln construction in full swing—a process that will continue until the onset of the monsoon.
Brick kiln owners rarely recruit labour directly. Instead, they subcontract recruitment to sardars, who hire workers from different parts of the country on seasonal, task-based contracts. Acting as intermediaries between workers and owners, sardars also determine work schedules to ensure that production targets are met within the limited brick-making season.
According to the Department of Environment, 7,086 brick kilns are officially operating across the country; however, the actual number is widely believed to be nearly double. More than half of these kilns lack environmental clearance, and almost none fully comply with labour laws, particularly those concerning working hours and the prohibition of forced labour.
Pijuash Baulia Pintu, a human rights activist from Bangladesh’s deltaic regions, explains that brick kiln labour is recruited through a cycle of perpetual debt, locally known as dadan (informal credit). Towards the end of the monsoon, during the lean months of July and August, dadan agents are commonly found in villages and local bazaars.
These agents target impoverished households by offering small loans—typically between Tk 2,000 and Tk 10,000—similar to those provided by mohajons (moneylenders). Faced with urgent financial crises and limited alternatives, many accept these loans. Unable to repay the accumulating debt, borrowers are eventually compelled to migrate to brick kilns to work it off, effectively trapping them in an exploitative labour system.
In recent years, agricultural land in the deltaic regions has shrunk significantly due to saline water intrusion. As a result, many agricultural labourers, along with those affected by river erosion, floods, and droughts, are increasingly drawn into brick kiln work as a last resort.
Bappi Mondal, from Shyamnagar upazila in Satkhira, joined a brick kiln in Nabinagar, Savar, early in the season (September) under compulsion after taking an advance loan from a sardar.
Regardless of extreme cold or heat, work started at the same time each day. “We are woken between 2:45 and 3:00 a.m. After working continuously until 7:00 a.m., we get only a 20-minute break to eat,” he said. “Work then continues until around 11:00 a.m. or 12:30 p.m. We return home briefly, but work resumes again at around 1:00 p.m. and continues until 4:30 or 5:30 in the afternoon. By the time everything is finished, it is around 7:00 or 7:30 in the evening. Altogether, we work about 15–16 hours a day, with no weekly holidays.”
Such hours are not exceptional but routine in brick kilns. Unable to endure the workload, Bappi fled after three months, midway through the season. As a result, he and his mother were subjected to abuse and violence because he failed to complete the six-month contract, despite having taken an advance of Tk 80,000.
Like Bappi, anyone who leaves before the season ends is required to repay double the loan amount; otherwise, they face abuse and inhuman treatment—an unwritten rule enforced in such cases.
Even when workers fall seriously ill, they are compelled to work. Those who attempt to escape are often caught by sardars, beaten, and sometimes tied with chains or ropes used for livestock. Workers are dragged back and assaulted with bricks, while owners usually remain silent. Most abuse is carried out by sardars, who are under contract to ensure uninterrupted production throughout the season.
Last year, Bappi lost his father to a heart attack after he could no longer endure the excessive workload in a brick kiln. In Bangladesh, there is no reliable survey of deaths in brick kilns, and accidents and fatalities are often concealed by owners.
Mud-made red bricks have long symbolised sustainable infrastructure, from building homes to megaprojects. Yet we rarely pause to consider the invisibilised labour system within brick-kiln manufacturing and the human cost behind it: the brutal extraction of labour that reduces kiln workers to forced labourers, treated less as human beings and more as labouring machines. The dadan trap binds workers in ways that leave them unable to escape, compelling them to endure excessive and torturous work that often results in slow death through illness and chronic health complications.
Under the Constitution and existing labour laws, all forms of forced labour are prohibited and constitute criminal offences. However, the working hours and recruitment practices in most brick kilns clearly amount to forced labour, yet remain largely invisible. Why do these inhuman labour practices still persist? On this issue, labour law expert Advocate AKM Nasim stated: “The non-implementation of labour law provisions for brick manufacturing workers is widespread. Basic workers’ rights, including the issuance of appointment letters, remain largely unimplemented. Workers are also reluctant to seek redress through legal channels such as DIFE (Department of Inspection for Factories and Establishments) and labour courts, as these are neither convenient nor accessible to them. Despite the rights guaranteed by law, weak enforcement allows employers to engage workers on their own terms, disregarding legal requirements.”
Taslima Akter, another labour rights activist, said that while bonded and forced labour are legally prohibited, such practices continue in less visible forms in brick kilns. Seasonal contracts, she added, effectively imprison workers, making the system inhumane and unacceptable. She called for stronger legal protections, targeted labour policies for informal-sector workers, and special task forces to dismantle exploitative labour contracts.
Md Raihan Raju is a journalist at The Daily Star and can be reached at [email protected]
