Ordinance, domestic worker would include ‘every person who renders domestic services (i.e., services pertaining to household affairs) to his employer in lieu of wages or any other consideration’.46 However, this Ordinance, as its title would connote, has not been passed for giving any specific rights to domestic workers or imposing any obligation on the employers vis-à-vis the workers; rather this has been passed merely for imposing an obligation on the domestic workers in very limited areas covering parts of the Dhaka metropolitan area only that they must report and register their names and address with the police.47 Given that the Ordinance was promulgated by a martial law regime in Pakistani colonial era, its emphasis on reporting and registrations is perhaps hardly surprising. Pointing to some features of the Labour Act, 2006, an analyst has commented that from the view point of the domestic workers, this legislation actually moves backwards.48 For example, as domestic workers were included in the definition of workers as contained in the Minimum Wages Ordinance, 1961,49 wages for them could be fixed under the legal mechanism provided for in the Ordinance. However, as Section 353(1) of the Bangladesh Labour Act, 2006 repeals the Minimum Wages Ordinance, 1961, the wages for domestic workers cannot now be fixed under the statutory regime without the enactment of any new legal instrument. The Children (Pledging of Labour) Act, 193350 (also repealed by the Bangladesh Labour Act, 2006) declared any agreement to pledge the labour of children void.51 However, it would appear that such pledge would in any case violate the fundamental rights as enshrined in the Constitution of Bangladesh as well as an agreement against public policy and hence, would not appear to be enforceable in any court. Similarly, wages for domestic workers were never fixed under the Ordinance of 1961. Thus, the 46 Ibid, Section 2 (a). 47 Ibid, Sections 2(c), 3, and Schedule to the Ordinance. 48 Dr. Naim Ahmed, Safeurading the Rights of Domestic Workers: Existing Laws and Ways to Move Forward <http://www.dwatch-bd.org/ggtp/keynote.pdf> at 19th May 2014 [Ahmed]. 49 Ordinance No. XXXIV of 1961, Section 2(9). 50 Act No. II of 1933. 51 Ibid, Section 3. 12