The Textiles and Apparels Department of Beximco Industrial Park in the Sarab area of Gazipur Nagar has announced that this company’s 14 factories will be completely closed. Mandated from tomorrow, Friday (28 February), the authorities have announced they will lay off all the workers of these factories. On Wednesday this announcement was made in a spiral signed by the organization.
In this brief, it is said that a total of 14 institutions, including Beximco Limited (except Yarn Unit-1) in Gazipur and its 13 other related institutions, are being informed of special information to all the officers, employees, and workers. It is hereby notified that because of a scarcity of work in the factories, a layoff was revealed in accordance with related provisions of the Bangladesh Laboure Act, 2006 (last amended in 2018). From February 28, due to there being no possibility of work available, the workers of the factories are being laid off under section 16(7) and, as a result, section 20(3). Synchronously, all operations of those institutions are being completely shut down. As per the applicable laws and regulations, all dues of the laid-off workers, officers, and employees will be settled. These payments will be paid out gradually from March 9. Considering this inability to pay regular compensation and entitlements, labor unrest spread across several factories of the Beximco Group. The monthly payment expenses for the workers at the industrial park amount to 60 crore taka, and the wage expenses for the officers total 15 crore taka. To normalize this situation, Bangladesh Bank gave two provisions of the Banking Companies Act and decorated for a loan via Janata Bank to pay compensations and entitlements at Beximco’s factories.
Nonetheless, the Superintendent of Police Gazipur Industrial Area, A.K.M. Jahirul Islam, has declared that currently there is no labor unrest in the factories. He said that the workers are in a peaceful state, and in this area, police have been deployed. Throughout the High Court hearing of a writ petition, Bangladesh Bank notified that Beximco’s 78 institutions were indebted to a total of 50 thousand crore taka to 16 banks and 7 financial institutions. Roughly as a bad loan 32 thousand crore taka has been classified. Salman F. Rahman was arrested after the fall of the Awami League government in a student uprising. Despite dealing with numerous banks, Beximco only opened loans with Janata Bank. A large part of the company’s Tk 23,557 crore loan to that bank is now in default. As the group’s debt exceeded the single borrower limit, Beximco was also barred from taking fresh bank loans.
The decision to close 16 factories of Beximco Industrial Park was made after the decision of the advisory council committee meeting regarding the review of the labor and business situation of Beximco industrial establishments in the meeting room of the Ministry of Labor and Employment on December 15.The owners of the institutions are former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s advisor Salman F. Rahman. According to the government, the reason for the closure is that the factory is not able to operate due to lack of orders and bank defaults.
Source: Prothom Alo
