A section of Bangladeshi owners Sunday reopened their garment factories with a part of their workforce amid continued protests in different districts demanding arrears.

At least 1,427 out of 7,602 export-oriented factories have reopened, industrial police officials said.

The move comes although there is no sign that the coronavirus outbreak has been contained.

Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association had earlier issued a timetable for reopening the factories and guidelines on maintaining social distance inside the facilities. Some 227 factories were open on the outskirts of Dhaka, 438 in Gazipur, 412 in Chattogram, 193 in Narayanganj, 75 in Mymensingh and 82 in Khulna, according to industrial police.

Of these factories, 480 are members of the BGMEA, 121 BKMEA, 58 Bangladesh Textile Mills Association, and 198 under Bangladesh Export Processing Zones Authority. There are 570 other factories that have reopened, officials said.

Meanwhile, at least 650 factories have not paid their employees as of yesterday leading to sporadic protests, police sources said.

In Ashulia, many workers, who travelled miles on foot a day ago to join work, complained that they were turned away from their factory gates because the management wanted to keep fewer people inside, said Khairul Mamun Mintu, organising secretary of Bangladesh Garments Workers Trade Union Centre.

The management should have asked only those who were needed at the factory to travel all the way from their villages, he told The Daily Star.

Over 300 sacked workers in Ashulia's Tajpur area demonstrated inside their factory.

The protesters told our correspondent that they found out that they have been laid off after they went to the factory.

Alam Khan, assistant superintendent at Dhaka Industrial Police-1, said police teams were deployed near the factory and officers were talking to the management.

Around 1,000 workers of four other factories in Savar and Ashulia demonstrated in front of their factories demanding last month's salary, labour leaders said.

Several hundred workers of eight factories demonstrated in Narayanganj, a hotspot of the coronavirus outbreak, denouncing layoffs and demanding arrears. A couple of hundred workers also blocked Dhaka-Narayanganj highway.

Workers were fired from at least 72 factories in Narayanganj, officials said.

There were protests also in Tongi and Gazipur demanding arrears.

"The staggered approach has been adopted so that they [factory managements] cannot all rush at one go and so that the influx of workers can be avoided," said a message sent by the association.

"What we have given is a general outline of the reopening. There are factories who have opened and have written to us…These factories, few in numbers, have started operating in a limited scale," BGMEA said in a WhatsApp message yesterday.

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