Frantic search for the missing
A worker who had been trapped in the collapsed Rana Plaza waves to volunteers and people after being rescued yesterday around 1:30pm. Photo: Rashed Shumon
The clock ticked away as relatives of those missing under the rubble of Rana Plaza ran around frantically looking for their loved ones -- dead or alive.
They moved back and forth between the scene of the building collapse to the hospitals and morgues in Savar, Ashulia and Dhaka.
Defying scorching heat, Nepal Moni Lal was looking for his 26-year-old daughter Kajali Rani, a helper at the sewing section of Phantom Tac Ltd on the fourth floor of the nine-storey building. The high rise caved in on Wednesday morning leading to huge casualties.
At around 10:00am yesterday, diminishing hope and exhaustion overcame him. He fainted and was admitted to Savar Sadar Hospital.
With Nepal were his 15 relatives, friends and neighbours, all of who have been looking for Kajali since Wednesday.
They have been to every clinics and hospitals in Savar and Ashulia. They also went to Dhaka Medical College Hospital, its morgue, and Pongu Hospital, but in vain.
Four of them have been at Adharchandra High School, where the bodies of the victims were lined up. Three days into the accident, still there is no sign of Kajali.
“Bring my mother back. I won't let her go back to work,” wailed Kajali's only son Srabon aged six.
Her mother Bimala Rani has stopped taking foods since she heard about the accident.
Bimala and her husband came to their daughter's house in Majidpur, Savar from Dhamrai on Wednesday.
Even Kajali's parents-in-law have joined the family from Mirzapur, Tangail. Everyone is waiting anxiously for some news about Kajali.
Hundreds of families of the missing people are going through the same ordeal.
Several hundred people queued up in the school ground to look for their loved ones among the bodies of the victims. Every time an ambulance arrived there with bodies, anxiety rippled through the area.
Following the accident, four relatives of Nasrin Begum went missing. She along with 18 relatives and friends joined the efforts to find the missing four.
Of the 18, three became sick from exhaustion and were admitted to a hospital.
On Thursday, the body of Nasrin's cousin Nupur was found in the ground of Adharchandra High School.
Yesterday evening, Nasrin's nephew Siddiqui and cousin Murtoza were found undergoing treatment at Combined Military Hospital in Savar.
However, her other cousin Champa, 22, remained missing till last night.
Comments