Rana Plaza collapse: 10 years after Bangladesh's deadliest industrial disaster

By Md. Kamruzzaman

DHAKA, Bangladesh (AA) – Moshammat Bulbuli slowly walked back to her single room in a house in the poor neighborhood of Savar in the Bangladeshi capital of Dhaka, where she has been living for many years.

Bulbuli, 34, now works as a domestic servant but was a garment factory worker and one of the survivors of Bangladesh's deadliest industrial disaster in 2013, which has left her traumatized even after 10 years.

"I still have pains in different parts of my body, and doctors have prescribed me some medicine that I will have to take for the rest of my life," Bulbuli told Anadolu.

She was one of approximately 5,000 workers at Rana Plaza, a multi-story building with five garment factories in the Savar area, when it collapsed on April 24, 2013, killing over 1,100 and injuring nearly 2,500.

"I'll never be able to keep my mind stable again after that horrible incident. Whenever I approach any building, it appears to me that it will collapse with heavy jerking," she said of her traumatized life.

A sudden disaster has changed her entire life and will chase her from behind until death, said Bulbuli, who has no children and her husband also left her after several years of marriage due to her health and other issues.

"I still can't sleep at night because of nightmares related to such tragedy, and every moment I feel the dangerous shaking of the building and collapsing it with me and my colleagues," she said, recalling her entire day under huge debris, watching her colleagues' bodies and some dying one after the other after the Rana Plaza collapse.

Thousands of other survivors of the tragedy are in the same situation, with the majority still unemployed and many suffering from various physical and psychological issues.

The incident drew widespread criticism from around the world for the precarious working conditions and lack of workers’ safety and security in Bangladesh's readymade garment industry.

Nearly four million workers, more than 80% of whom are poor and deprived women, are currently employed in 3,000 garment factories, which are also the country's main exporting sector.

Following the tragedy and subsequent international condemnation, authorities and garment industry owners have implemented a variety of measures to protect the country's primary foreign currency-earning source.

Since then, many owners have relocated their factories from congested commercial buildings in major cities to environmentally friendly areas outside of towns.

While for workplace safety, the concerned authorities have also taken several measures, including regularly checking the fire extinguisher system, which was lax prior to the incident.

According to the latest Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers & Exporters Association (BGMEA) update, the readymade garment sector now has 195 US Green Building Council’s (USGBC) Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) certified green factories, the highest in the world.

- Workers’ fate unchanged

Though the country’s apparel sector is second only to China in the world, readymade garment workers in Bangladesh earn the lowest monthly wages in comparison to other countries.

Many workers told Anadolu that the visible developments in the sector have little impact on their daily lives.

"My monthly salary is only 9,750 taka (approximately $92). I have two children in the village to whom I send money, and I pay my house rent here in Dhaka, leaving me with little for food and other basic needs," Sharmin Begum, a garment worker in the Savar area, told Anadolu.

Sharmin, whose husband abandoned her many years ago, lives in a small room of a house in a slum area of the city and pays 3,000 takas per month for that room.

Referring to the increase in the price of daily commodities, she said the government and garment owners profit greatly from this sector, while workers receive minimal benefits.

"These workers work a lot for the country to earn for our nation and our national economy, but they live a very distressed life in an unsanitary environment," Mushrefa Mishu, president of the Bangladesh Garment Workers' Unity Forum, told Anadolu.

She added that poverty forces the majority of women garment workers to live in slums.

Referring to the overall changes in the garment sector since the Rana Plaza tragedy, she added that the fate of workers has remained unchanged in the last 10 years, with no improvement.

The labor rights activist, who has been imprisoned several times during movements for the rights of garment workers, has called on the government to amend labor laws, claiming that they favor the owners.

- New wage board

However, garment owners and leaders of the country's leading trade associations have claimed that they pay reasonable wages to workers in garment factories.

"We are always sympathetic to the needs of our employees. In the last 10 years, we have raised wages several times and improved workplace safety and security," said BGMEA President Faruque Hassan.

He told Anadolu that the association has already requested that the government establish a new minimum wage board for workers in garment factories.

"It is already under consideration, and we hope to receive feedback from the government by this year," he said, adding that their monthly salary should be satisfactory because workers' mental and physical satisfaction is essential for increasing productivity in the country's key exporting sector.

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