Rana Plaza Tragedy: Twelve years on, wounds still fresh

Staff Reporter :

The 12th anniversary of the Rana Plaza collapse—the deadliest industrial disaster in Bangladesh’s readymade garment (RMG) sector—is being observed on Thursday.
Various rights organizations, workers’ groups, and left-leaning political parties, including the Rana Plaza Survivors’ Association, have organized events to honor the memory of those who lost their lives in the tragedy.
On Wednesday evening, workers and activists lit candles at the Savar Bus Stand in remembrance of the victims.
Rafiqul Islam Sujon, President of the Bangladesh Garments and Industrial Workers Federation, said that every year on this day, they hold various programmes to commemorate the lives lost and to demand justice. He reiterated the call to declare April 24 as National Workers’ Mourning Day.
Workers’ organizations have also renewed demands to acquire the land where Rana Plaza once stood and build a permanent memorial. They called for the rehabilitation of injured and affected workers, maximum punishment for those responsible, and compensation equivalent to a lifetime’s income for the deceased and injured.
Despite the passage of 12 years, the cases related to the Rana Plaza collapse in Savar, on the outskirts of the capital, remain unresolved. Compensation for many of the victims has also yet to be delivered.
“Both the criminal and compensation cases in the Rana Plaza incident remain pending. These cases must now be resolved without further delay,” Supreme Court lawyer Barrister Jyotirmoy Barua told the media recently.
He added, “The victims have not received the Tk 17 to 25 lakh each as promised by a committee formed under High Court orders. The funds received from some international organizations are mere donations—not formal compensation.”
On April 24, 2013, the illegally constructed Rana Plaza building, which housed five garment factories, collapsed, killing 1,138 people and injuring over 2,000 others. The tragedy exposed serious flaws in factory safety standards and workers’ rights in Bangladesh’s multi-billion-dollar RMG industry.