Staff Reporter :
The Shipping Ministry has formed a panel to investigate the death of a six- grader school student who died in the ambulance as the authority delayed the departure of a ferry at Khathalbari jetty in Madaripur for three hours.
The two-member panel headed by Joint Secretary Shahnowas Dilruba Khan has been asked to submit the probe report to the ministry in seven days, the ministry said in a statement on Monday.
The family members of the dead student alleged that the ferry was anchored at the jetty for three hours on Thursday night waiting for a government official who was later identified as Joint Secretary Md Abdus Sabur Mondal working for the Access to Information (a2i). They requested the police and Bangladesh Inland Water Transport Authority (BIWTA) not to delay the ferry, as it was a race against time for the safe survival of the boy. But that went in vain. Calling 999, the emergency number for government services, also proved futile, the family alleged.
The ferry, named ‘Cumilla’, departed only when the car carrying the Joint Secretary boarded the vessel around 11:00pm but Titas Ghosh, 11, a student of grade six, died from brain haemorrhage while the family was still in the middle of the river.
Titas, son of Tapas Ghosh from Kaliya in Narail, was a student of Kaliya Pilot Secondary School. On Thursday evening, he was initially taken to a private hospital in Khulna after he was severely injured in a motorcycle accident.
He was later being shifted to Dhaka in an ambulance equipped with an intensive care unit, as the doctor flagged his condition as critical.
The ambulance reached the jetty at around 8:00pm. The ferry was at the jetty at the time. They begged for help from the jetty operators and the police on duty, but no one budged and the ferry stayed there, Titas’s elder sister Tannisha Ghosh said.
“A VIP cost the life of my brother. Is a VIP more important than a life in this country?” questioned Tannisha.
“My sister cried begging at their feet, but the authorities did not start the ferry. Rather, they said they will lose their jobs if they do so, as a VIP will be coming. They did not care that our patient was dying. We called 999 when we failed to get any assistance from them but that too never worked,” said Titas’s uncle Bijoy Ghosh.
The authority could not start the ferry despite the request from Titas’s family as they received the ’emergency message’ from the Madaripur deputy commissioner, said the BIWTA officials in Kathalbari jetty.
“The DC sir told me that a VIP will be travelling and the ferry should not depart before he arrives. I was not at the jetty at the time and just told our staff there to hold the ferry for the VIP. I am not aware of what happened next,” said Md Salam Hossain Mia, Manager of the jetty.
“It takes double the time nowadays to cross the river due to stronger currents. Also, there are not many ferries plying at night. There is always some traffic congestion at the jetty. But we always give preference to ambulances and serious patients,” he said.
“Joint Secretary Md Abdus Sabur Mondal of A2i project was travelling to Dhaka from Pirojpur. He told me about the ferry before he reached the Kathalbari jetty and I told Manager Salam about this,” Madaripur Deputy Commissioner Md Wahidul Islam told reporters.
He said, “But I wasn’t aware that there was a severely injured patient waiting in the ferry. The manager never informed me about it. I got to know about it on Sunday.”
“Abdus Sabur Mondal is the former Deputy Commissioner of Chandpur. He is also a Joint Secretary. Therefore, he is deemed to be a VIP. Officials of this level are given special importance when they travel on our waterways,” the DC said.
“I am very much embarrassed and speechless on the issue. I can’t explain you how much uneasiness I am feeling now,” Joint Secretary Mondal said.
He said, “I never asked people to hold the ferry for me. All I asked for was that I needed a way to go. They never asked for my decision on the issue.”
Madaripur DC Wahidul Islam formed another four-member probe body headed by Additional District Magistrate Shahidul Haque Patwary and asked it to submit the report within a week.
