Twenty first Century Ultra "Slave Labour"

In the American plantations, slave labour was bought & overworked. As they were bought, if they were worked to death too soon, one had to buy fresh labour. So seven years work (to death) was the optimum period arrived at. If they lived longer, they would not be cost-effective!

In post industrial England, there was no slavery, but "free" children, women & men were available in plenty. If they died soon, one need not buy others, as there were plenty more where they came from, readily available.  The American slaves had to be fed even when there was no work. The English poor could just be turned out into the street during slack period to fend for themselves. At the peak of this system, small children were worked to death under the whip, so much so that it was said that industrialists wore out nine generations of population in one generation. So capitalism was infinitely worse than slavery. 

Appalled at this state of things, the visionary Robert Owen, a Welsh industrialist himself (not a labour leader or communist, mind you) pioneered the  International Labour Organisation mandated 8 hours as the maximum working day. This can be treated as an Universal Human Right.

But after the second world war, to reconstruct their shattered economy, the Germans started working longer hours.  Appalled at this, the German Philosopher Josef Pieper, wrote a book "Leisure, the basis of Culture", where he critiqued this short sighted route to progress. He underlined that sufficient leisure is absolutely essential to maintain one's humanity.

This pernicious doctrine has raised its ugly head in post pandemic India now. The hard-earned humanistic social progress of centuries globally is now thrown to the winds under the guise of strengthening the nation by a few captains of industry. Are they to be  lauded for this or rather considered eligible for prosecution under International Law for human rights violations?