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Stampede at Clothing Giveaway Kills at Least 20 in Bangladesh

At least 22 people were killed and dozens injured in a stampede for free clothes at a factory in northern Mymensingh on July 10.

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A few 1,500 people, many desperately poor, had turned up to receive free clothes in the town of Mymensingh, north of the capital Dhaka.

The victims died on a stampede when hundreds of people stormed the home of a businessman for a charity handout during the holy Muslim month of Ramadan, police said.

Police and witnesses said since Thursday night over 1,000 people had started gathering on the narrow Atul Chakrabarty Road outside the home of zakat donor Mohammad Shamim, who owns a chewing tobacco brand.

Ambia Begum, 45, arrived at the giveaway at dawn, along with seven female family members. They were beat severely and this he reason for stampede occurred.

“Oh Allah, why did I come here?” Mr Kamrul Islam, the senior officer at a police station near the factory, said the death toll was likely to rise further. Television footage showed relatives rushing through the entrance and corridors, cradling lifeless bodies in their arms.

The committee was asked to submit its report in three working days.

District Governor Mustakim Billah told reporters that, “we are taking Legal action will be against them”.

In November 2012, a blaze at a factory making apparel for Walmart and other Western labels in Dhaka left 111 people dead, the industry’s most deadly accident made worse by sub-standard safety equipment and locked fire exits.

A doctor at the hospital where the dead and injured were taken said all the victims were women and children.

President Abdul Hamid, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and Speaker Shirin Sharmin Chaudhury expressed profound shock at the deaths.

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It is common in the country for the rich Bangladeshis to distribute free garments among other things to poor people during Ramadan.

Bangladesh