Eskaton fire victims laid to rest
With one of his legs in a cast, Jahangir Alam was at the funeral of his beloved daughter in his ancestral home in Sherpur yesterday. With him was his wife, who was also injured in their attempt to get away from the fire in Eskaton early Thursday.
Their daughter Afrin Jahan Juthi, 17, an HSC examinee from Viqarunnisa Noon School & College, was among the three dead in the fire that broke out in a five-storey building.
She was killed while trying to exit the building using the stairs, said her family.
"We wanted our daughter to become a doctor. But all our hopes and dreams were shattered," Jahangir, a public works department official, said in an emotion-choked voice while talking to this correspondent over phone.
After the fire broke out around 4:00am, Jahangir came out of their fourth- floor flat and took shelter on the building's rooftop on Dilu Road with other neighbours.
Jahangir then helped some of his neighbours escape to the adjacent building's rooftop. Jahangir suffered leg injuries and his wife Umme Kulsum spinal wounds while going to the rooftop of the adjacent building. She attended the funeral on a stretcher.
"My sister-in-law's spine was broken. But she insisted on going to their village home in the ambulance that carried the body of Juthi," Jahangir's cousin Rabiul Alam Rumel told The Daily Star yesterday.
"We will admit our sister-in-law to the National Institute of Traumatology and Orthopaedic Rehabilitation after she returns to the capital," he added.
Six people were also injured in the fire.
Condition of Shahidul Kirmany Rony and his wife Jannatul Ferdous were unchanged. Rony with 43 percent and Jannat with 95 percent inhalation burns are now fighting for life at the intensive care unit of Sheikh Hasina National Institute of Burn and Plastic Surgery at Dhaka Medical College Hospital.
Dr Samanta Lal Sen, national coordinator of the burn institute, said the couple were on life support and their condition remained unchanged. "We are doing our level best for their recovery."
Talking to The Daily Star yesterday, Rony's sister Nasrin Akter said they were taking his brother's four-year-old son AKM Rushdi to his village home in Narsingdi for burial.
"We could not exchange a single word with my brother and sister-in-law since Thursday noon. Doctors told us that they were suffering from kidney and urinal complications," said Nasrin.
Burial of another fire victim Abdul Kader Liton, a buying house staff, was completed in his village home in Laxmipur around 8:00am yesterday, said his nephew Md Nurunnabi.
Condition of vegetable trader Monir Hossain, 40, his wife Sumyia Akter, 30, and sons Mahadi Hasan Rifat, 9, and nine-month-old Mahmudul Hasan has improved, said duty doctors at the burn and plastic surgery unit.
Meanwhile, the five-member body, formed by the fire service and civil defence authorities to investigate the incident, visited the building yesterday morning.
Abul Hosen, deputy director of Mymensingh Fire Service and Civil Defence, who leads the probe body, told this newspaper yesterday that they were primarily suspecting that the fire originated from the electrical board on the ground floor of the building.
Although it is a residential building, there are a buying house and a small garment factory with 10 sewing machines on the second floor. It is totally illegal, said Abul.
"We didn't get the building and the buying house owners. We will start recording statements of witnesses and the owners from tomorrow [Saturday]. After that, we would be able to say clearly what happened in the building," he Abul.
"Inspecting the building, it seems to us that the building has become risky after the fire. But we have suggested taking opinions from the Buet expert team."
The committee will submit its report within two weeks.
No one is staying in the building now. Except the victims' families, other residences visited the building yesterday and took their clothes and frozen food to their relatives' houses, said Lutfur Rahman, security guard of the building.
The Daily Star tried to contact the buying house, Classic Fashion International, through the telephone numbers available on its website, but nobody received the calls.
No case was filed with Hatirjheel Police Station till filing of this report yesterday evening.
Abul Bashar Mollah, sub-inspector of the police station, said if anyone communicated with them, they would definitely register a case.