BD factory victims face $6m compensation shortfall

DHAKA: Victims of Bangladesh’s worst industrial disaster are suffering a $6 million shortfall in a compensation fund two years after the tragedy that claimed more than 1,100 lives, fund organisers said on Monday.
Organisers of the trust fund estimated that $30 million in compensation was needed after the collapse of the Rana Plaza factory complex, where workers stitched clothes for Western retailers for poor pay.
On the eve of the second anniversary of the disaster this Friday, organisers of the trust set up by the retailers and labour groups said $24 million had been paid or pledged to families of those killed.
“Still we’ve a shortfall of around $6 million,” Mojtaba Kazazi, executive director of the trust’s claims administration, told AFP. Sultan Uddin Ahmed, a member of a committee that runs the trust fund, criticised retailers for not doing enough for dependants along with 1,500 workers who suffered horrific injuries in the disaster.