Dubbed the “Miracle Woman” Reshma Begum was dragged from the rubble and debris of the clothing factory 17 days after it collapsed in Bangladesh. But, as the seamstress’ survival story made headlines around the world, she has been accused of being part of a massive hoax.
Miss Begum was dramatically discovered among the tangled steel and concrete of the Bangladesh garment factory, where clothes were manufactured by suppliers for high street brands including Primark. Its collapse is considered to be the deadliest garment factory accident in history.
But a co-worker is now accusing the 19-year-old of faking the length of time she had been trapped in the ruins. He argued she was part of a hoax to improve the bad publicity that the authorities got during the disaster , in which 1,221 people died and about 2,500 were injured.
The male co-worker told local journalists that she had in fact escaped from the eight-storey Rana Plaza building in Savar, Dhaka, on the day it came down, scrambling from the rubble alongside him. The man told local journalists: ‘We escaped together. We both walked away from the rubble. We spent two days in hospital but then she vanished. The next time I saw her was on TV 17 days later. They said it was a miracle, but it was a fake.’
Miss Begum’s landlady told journalists from Dhaka’s pro-opposition newspaper Amar Desh, “Her eyes were wide open when they pulled her out and she did not appear to be sensitive to the bright sunlight. Her sari was not ripped or torn and appeared clean”.
By Aneesa Malik
