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" LABOUR LAWS AND NEW ECONOMIC AGENDA' LABOUR LAWS AND NEW ECONOMIC AGENDA'   [concluding remarks of the Author at SAARC LAW Conference at New Dehli (India) on 29th January, 1994]   By   Mr. Justice Ajmal Mian, Judge, Supreme Court of Pakistan   I am grateful to the organizers of the SAARC LAW Conference for having conferred honour on me by inviting me to co‑chair this Session. The papers which have been presented in this Session on the topic "Labour Laws and the New Economic Agenda" were quite informative and of high standard. By reading the above topic one gets the impression that the first part of the topic, namely "Labour Laws" has no nexus with the second part of it, i.e. "The New Economic Agenda". But minute analysis indicates that the above two parts of the topic have nexus with each other. The above topic has also nexus with the main objective of the SAARC given in its Charter namely, "to prompote the welfare of the people of South Asia and to improve their quality of life". I would like first to deal with the above two parts of the topic separately as to their origin and development and then as to how they have nexus with each other. The Labour Laws have their origin in the Sub‑Continent as far back as nineteenth century. First enactments consisted of enactments such as Assam Labour Acts, The Workmen Breach of Contract Act of 1859 and the Employers' and Workmen's (Disputes) Act, 1860, which rendered a workman liable to criminal penalties for breach of contract. Then we had Factories Acts of 1881 and 1891 which inter alia regulated employment and working hours of Women and Children. After that, Mines Act was passed in 1909. This was followed inter alia by the Workmen's Compensation Act,…