Over Tk 23cr spent so far

The government has so far spent Tk 23.55 crore for the victims of Rana Plaza collapse from the prime minister's relief fund since the worst-ever industrial tragedy of the country occurred exactly a year ago.
Labour Secretary Mikail Shipar revealed this at an event in the capital yesterday, adding that each of the families of 962 workers, who died in the tragedy, received financial assistance ranging between Tk 1 lakh and Tk 5 lakh from the fund.
"We admit that this compensation is far less than they require," he said while speaking at the event organised by the Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD) to publish a report titled "One Year after the Rana Plaza Tragedy: Where Do We Stand? the Victims, the Sector and the Value Chain" at Brac Centre Inn.
In the programme, Shipar raised the death toll from the tragedy to 1,135 as a skull had recently been found at the collapse site.
Different organisations and companies from home and abroad have donated Tk 127 crore to the fund for the restitution of the victims.
Shipar said 36 critically injured workers have been given Tk 10 lakh to Tk 15 lakh each from the fund.
However, the figure does not match with that provided by the CPD study.
The study says only 41 out of 332 critically injured and amputated victims have so far received the compensation, meaning that around 88 percent of them are yet to receive any financial assistance from the PM's fund.
The labour secretary also said that the families of 173 dead workers could not be compensated yet due to the delay in identification process.
However, the identities of 88 deceased workers have just been confirmed through the DNA test.
"We will provide financial assistance to the families of these 88 workers as soon as the administration in the districts sends us the list of their rightful heirs," he said.
Shipar said the government had already begun the process of providing Tk 50,000 each to the families of 3,000 workers out of around 3,600 victims of the tragedy.
"We hope we will be able to distribute the money by Thursday," said Shipar.
The rest will be compensated by the British retailer Primark, one of the 29 international brands that sourced apparel products from the factories housed in Rana Plaza.
The CPD study also revealed that a total of 777 workers injured in the tragedy have been provided jobs at various organisations upon the PM's directive.