Staff Reporter:
Around 3,620 workers and 120 staff members of five factories of TNZ Apparels Limited in Gazipur have received their outstanding monthly salaries three days ahead of schedule.
The workers were paid their salaries for September on Thursday. The authorities have agreed to pay October salaries by 30 November.
According to a company employee, the salary was supposed to be paid by Sunday (17 November), but we received our salary in our bKash account on Thursday evening.
The employees are now happy as the company’s owners have fulfilled their promises, he said.
TNZ Apparels Limited Chairman Hedayatul Haque said the factories will reopen Saturday (16 November).
He hopes that the workers will go to work and help offset the owners’ losses by participating in the factory’s production.
Earlier on 9 November, workers of five factories owned by TNZ Group namely TNZ Apparels Limited, Basic Clothing Limited, Expo Cartoon, MNS Yarn Dyeing, and Apparel Art Limited, started a protest by blocking the Dhaka-Mymensingh Highway in Mogharkhal area of Gazipur city, demanding outstanding salaries.
Later, the Labour Ministry announced that the government would cover workers’ wages, and a meeting with labour representatives led to an agreement between the government and employers.
On Monday night, a compromise agreement was signed by 31 labour representatives, BGMEA leaders, and labour ministry officials, ensuring September and October salaries are paid by 17 and 30 November respectively.
The chairman of TNZ Apparels Limited said that they paid Tk8 crore in the first installment ahead of schedule with government assistance.
He regretted and said, “The institution has invested over Tk350 crore and paid over Tk125 crore to the bank as interest. The company faced difficulties in obtaining a Tk8 crore loan to pay workers’ salaries due to a delay in obtaining funds from exports.”
