Textile engineers will observe a daylong work stoppage at all garment factories on Sunday if the managing director and the director of Noman Group, who allegedly beat up their fellow engineer, are not arrested by Thursday.

The announcement came from a press conference at Jatiya Press Club, organised by the Institute of Textile Engineers and Technologists, and Engineers Institute of Bangladesh.

Around two hundred engineers joined the event, eventually turning it into a demonstration against the alleged torture of their fellow engineer Masum Azad, a senior general manger (GM) of Noman Composite Textile Ltd at Bhaluka in Mymensingh.

According to a case, Managing Director ASM Rafiqul Islam and his sister Noor-e-Yesmin Fatima, a director, beat Azad up for "stealing" the company's money.

A recent Facebook post accompanied by three pictures showing injuries on Azad's back and his plastered right hand has sparked the protest. 

At the press conference, Azad said that on the allegation of embezzling money, he was brought to the head office of Noman Group in the capital's Motijheel on Tuesday.

The MD, Rafiqul, beat him up with an iron rod and Director Yesmin pointed a pistol at his head and threatened that he would face dire consequence if he spoke out in this  regard, he said. The owners of the group also took his signatures on a blank paper and a non-judicial stamp, he said. A case was filed over the "torture" against the MD and the director and some five to six others, on Saturday with Motijheel Police Station.    

Contacted, one of the accused Fatima said Azad stole around Tk 6-7 crore from the factory over the years, and he was caught on Tuesday.

Angry staff beat him for that in their absence on the factory premises, she added. "But we strongly regret the beating; it should not have happened."

However, she alleged that Azad owned two factories under his name and had 17 gold and platinum credit cards of different banks, which were the "proofs of his thieving".

"A quarter is trying to tarnish our company's image," she alleged. Officer-in-Charge of Motijheel Police Station BM Farman Ali said on receiving of the case, police went to Noman Group's office Saturday but did not find any accused there.