The arrears of Beximco workers will be paid by February, after selling the mortgaged shares of Beximco Pharma and Shinepukur Ceramics, said Labour and Employment Adviser Brig Gen (retd) M Sakhawat Hussain on Tuesday.

He came up with the announcement at a press conference held at the secretariat in Dhaka.

Earlier, the adviser attended a meeting of the Advisory Council Committee to review the labour and business situation of Beximco Industrial Park.

Sakhawat said Tk550-Tk600 crore will be needed to pay the arrears of the workers of all lay-off organisations of Beximco.

“The government will pay the salaries and allowances by February once this amount isn’t managed by selling the shares,” he said.

The adviser said the Beximco group took Tk28,544.14 crore from 12 banks as loans and it will be investigated how the loans were approved.

It is a bigger (loan) scam than the theft of the Bangladesh Bank reserves, he thinks.