Endless Misery of Nimble Fingers: The Rana Plaza Disaster

Abstract

In search of better luck and lives, poor women from rural Bangladesh come to urban areas of the country to work in the garments industry from which the country is earning the majority of its foreign income. The country's fate is changing due to the industry; so is the fate of its owners, but the question is how much has the fate of the poor women who work in it changed? How empowered are these women as a result of their employment in the factories? Investigation has shown that women are victimized as a result of obvious gender discrimination. They become victims of any kind of disaster, including both human-made and natural. The disgraceful work environment has always pressured them into forced labor, often under threat and sometimes sexual harassment. The collapse of the eight-story Rana Plaza garment factory on April 24, 2013 has consequently caused another hidden disaster in women's lives, the uncertainty of life in the future and post traumatic disorder. Economic access provided economic emancipation to some extent to these garment worker women. Paradoxically, the endless misery of women's lives because of this human-made disaster is questioning the meaning of “women's economic empowerment.”