The plainclothes police said several organised gangs in Chittagong Port provide specific information about such heavy vehicles to highway robbers continuously over phone helping them to commit the crimes, which cost the garment makers high.
Detective Branch (DB) of Police in separate drives raided various parts in Keraniganj, Nawabganj and Islampur of the capital Thursday and arrested seven alleged members of inter-district robbers. They also recovered a covered van laden with imported fabrics worth about Tk 25 million from their possession.
The criminals hijacked the vehicle of Rio Fashion and Rio Design Ltd from the city's Agargaon area in the early hours of December 19 on its way to the garment factory located at Mirpur from the port city.
"After hijacking the vehicle the robbers sold the looted fabrics to cloth merchants in Old Dhaka for Tk 1.5 million," said senior assistant police commissioner of DB Mashiur Rahman, who led the drives.
The police official said a section of cloth merchants in old town were the main customers of the looted items. The police could detain two of such merchants.
"We need to further interrogate the arrestees to extract more information, which will help us to track down the ringleaders of the robbers," he added.
Arrested cloth trader Ebnul, who has a fabric shop at Islampur, told the FE that most of the traders in the older part of the city are interested to purchase the illegal products at cheaper rates to earn more profits.
"We've already paid Tk 1.10 million to the hijackers.
Islampur, Sadarghat and Keraniganj are the places where demand for such items is high," he said, adding that the robbers negotiate with the traders before going for a new operation.
Chairman of Rio Fashion and Rio Design Haruk Ahmed said they imported 68,000 metre fabrics to manufacture 50,000 pieces of shirts for the US brand Ecko.
"The incident forced us to seek more time for consignments as we're supposed to make delivery of Tk 250 million worth of orders in this week," he said, adding that the18-billion apparel industry will lose its image to the international buyers if government fails to stop such robberies immediately.
About 3,000 workers of the factory make clothing for top retailers like Wal-mart, Li and Fung, Target and Top Grade.
Expressing concern over the growing highway robberies, President of Exporters Association of Bangladesh Abdus Salam Murshedy said the government should step up police petrol on the highways to stem the robberies.
He said highway robberies has emerged as yet another hurdle for the sector, which has already been facing a tough time due to energy crisis and ongoing economic recession in the EU (European Union) countries.
"We need to amend the country's existing laws as the criminals come out from jails due to the legal loopholes and engage themselves in the same crime again and again," he added.
Law enforcers in 2010 arrested a gang and recovered a large amount of fabrics worth $0.3 million of Standard Group from the city's Banasri area. But the alleged robbers secured bail and came out from the prison.
Mr Murshedy, also managing director of one of the country's leading apparel groups - Envoy Group, said the exporters face difficulties in maintaining timely shipments due to such crime. "It is damaging the image of the country among the overseas business community."
According to the data of Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association (BGMEA), the RMG unit had to suffer immensely due to at least 25 major highway robberies over the last three years.
Garments accounted for nearly 80 per cent of the country's $22.93 billion exports in 2011-2011 financial year. The industry employs more than three million people. Most of the workers of garment factories are women.
News:
The Financial Express, Sat, 04/02/2012If you liked the post then,
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