Bangladesh’s historic state-owned Muslin Cotton Mills has reopened in Gazipur district after the ownership was transferred to Masers Reefat Garments Company. Production was stopped at the largest muslin cotton mill in Asia in 1990 for its failure to pay wages and salaries to its 2,885 workers amid serious mismanagement.

Set up on 100 acres of land on the bank of river Shitalakhya in Kaliganj in 1952, the mill once had three sections — spinning, looming and dyeing. Before its closure, the company used to make fabrics and yarn out of cotton. Speaking at a function to reopen the closed textile mill, Abdul Latif Siddiqui, Minister of Jute and Textiles, said after 24 years of closure the government took an initiative to reopen the historic cotton mill. The Muslin Cotton Mills would generate employment opportunities for 25,000 people in the Gazipur district.