Faced with arrest orders, two of the owners of the five readymade garment factories housed in the collapsed nine-storey commercial building in Savar have surrendered to police.
They are Mahbubur Rahman Tapas and Bazlul Samad Adnan, owners of New Weave Bottoms and New Weave Style, respectively.
They turned themselves in to police at the BGMEA Bhaban in the early hours of Saturday responding to a call from the industry lobby.
President of the Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers’ and Exporters’ Association (BGMEA) Atiqul Islam told bdnews24.com: “We had urged them to surrender. After they appeared here (BGMEA Bhaban), the Detective Branch of police arrested them at around 12:30am and took them away.”
Deputy Inspector General (DIG) of police (Dhaka range) Md Nuruzzaman confirmed bdnews24.com that the detectives had arrested the two owners.
The death toll climbed to at 307 as rescuers look for last survivors under tons of debris two days after the huge structure, that developed cracks on Tuesday, collapsed all of a sudden at this suburban township Savar at around 8:30am on Wednesday.
Most of the victims of the country’s worst ever collapse were garment workers while the building housed five readymade garment factories alongside 300 shops with nearly 5,000 workers.
Local residents say some 3,500 people were working on that day.
Rescuers have pulled out more than 2,348 people alive from the ruins so far but fear that the number of victims would go up sharply as many people still remained trapped under the debris for over 60 hours.
They have come up with a list of 565 people who are still unaccounted for.
Many survivors alleged that the owners of their garment factories forced them to go back to work on Wednesday morning against their will.
Rana, a Senior Joint Convenor of Awami League’s youth front Juba League’s Savar municipality unit, has been on the run since the collapse.
Of the remaining three garment factories, Aminul Islam is the owner of Phantom Appeals and Track while Anisur Rahman is the owner of Eithertex Textiles.
Police and RAJUK filed two lawsuits with the Savar Police Station on Wednesday night accusing Rana and the owners of the garment units owners of the garment factories for the loss of lives and damages.
Two days into the Savar tragedy, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina on Friday ordered immediate arrest of Rana along with the owners of five garment factories.
The order has already been sent to all agencies.
Source: Bd news24