Many thanks to Jeremy Seabrook, author of Freedom Unfinished: Fundamentalism and Popular Resistance in Bangladesh Today, for this guest blog from Dhaka.

On 29 July, a new minimum wage for garment workers in Bangladesh was set at 3,000 taka a month (US$40), a rise of 80% on the 1662.50 agreed in 2006 (US$24). Following this announcement, angry workers demonstrated all over Dhaka, vandalising shops, setting fire to cars, wrecking machinery, even attacking the upmarket shopping area of Gulshan Circle. The workers are demanding a minimum of 5,000 taka (about US$70). Three quarters of Dhaka’s 1.5 million garment workers are women, in an industry which earns 80% of the country’s foreign exchange. Some of the workers’ representatives have accepted the new minimum wage. Among those who have resisted, there have been arrests and imprisonment. The garments sector remains restive; and a sense of unfinished business hangs over the city.

For some years, minor disturbances have broken out almost daily on the streets of the capital – wages unpaid for months, rent hikes, abuse, fines for alleged indiscipline. Violence reflects a daily experience, in which workers are often killed in fires and accidents: in February 2010, 21 perished in a blaze in Gazipur in the industrial belt of Dhaka.

In April 2010, after riots in 22 factories, six thousand workers blockaded the Dhaka-Chittagong Highway. Late last year, several thousand people besieged the Nippon Garment Factory: police shot dead three people and injured over a hundred. They then lodged legal cases against the protesters, including those they had killed. On 25 May 2010, 35 people were hurt in pitched battles between police and workers protesting against housing costs. On 13 June 2010, seven garment factories were suspended, including those owned by the president of the Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers’ and Exporters’ Association: workers vandalised six factories and fought police. On 19 June, 7,000 workers ransacked 37 factories; police fired rubber bullets and teargas, and 100 people were injured. On 21 June, all apparel units in the industrial suburb of Ashulia were closed following skirmishes that blocked roads and burned vehicles. Demonstrations, outbreaks of vandalism and arson have continued since the new minimum wage was announced.