Laid-off jute mill workers stage sit-in for arrears

Employees of the closed People's Jute Mills started a sit-in programme from 7:00am yesterday demanding their arrears of last eight months.
Habibur Rahman, project director of the jute mill, said the sit-in would create a deadlock in the payment process.
He said the Bangladesh Jute Mills Corporation (BJMC) had no intention to deprive the employees. "A few complications have arisen regarding the payment process of arrears of permanent employees and employees absorbed on adhoc basis," Rahman added.
The sit-in will hinder payment of other financial benefits to the retrenched workers, which is scheduled to start next Sunday.
Payment of cheques against arrear wages of 15 weeks of remaining 332 retrenched workers could not be continued yesterday due to the protest.
The BJMC paid about Tk 4.90 crore until Tuesday.