Some innocent children and women were the worst victims of violence during hartals and blockades enforced by the BNP-Jamaat alliance ahead of the last parliamentary elections.
During these programmes, many women and children suffered severe burn injuries while they came out of their homes to do regular works.
On the other hand, many children were passing a traumatized life after being injured in bomb attacks. Political violence also took away their opportunity for education, compelling them to drop out of schools.
According to burn and plastic unit of DMCH, a total of 23 burn victims including two women died after fighting for life for few days there since October 2013.
From October 2013 to 11 February 2014, some 203 burn victims got treatment from the outdoor of burn unit of DMCH and 100 burn victims including women and children were admitted to the Hospital as their condition was not well, sources added. Three victims of political violence are now undergoing treatment at the burn unit of Dhaka Medical College Hospital, according to sources in DMCH.
Nasima Begum, 30, a garments worker, was admitted to DMCH with 43 percent of her body burned on October 26 last year. Fighting for life for 19 days she finally gave up on 14 November. She was retuning home by a bus when pickets attacked the vehicle full of garment workers in the capital’s Beribadh area. That was not a hartal day, but the day before.
Rahima, sister of Nasima, said, “My sister was not involved in politics, then why she became the victim of politics?” She said Nasima’s husband married another woman five years ago. After that she was living alone by working in garments factory. It was the reason for her to go to the factory on the eve of the hartal.
Like Nasima, another woman Shahina Akter, 42, employee of insurance company, died after fighting for life for five days at the Burn Unit of DMCH.
On January 6, seven-year-old Fahim was seriously injured in a cocktail explosion in the capital’s Moddho Badda area around 8:30am. The cocktail blew off three fingers of his left hand and two of his right hand. He also received injuries in his belly. He was released from the National Institute of Traumatology and Orthopaedic Rehabilitation (NITOR) on January 29. When he was supposed to be in class, he was continuously fighting against his physical challenges.
Like Fahim, many kids lost their limbs and became physically impaired and were passing inhuman life.
Partha Shankar Pal, resident surgeon of burn and plastic surgery unit of DMCH, said, “During the political violence, a huge number of patients came to us for treatment.”
“At that time most of the severely burnt victims were transferred to us from various hospital and clinics and we tried our best to save them,” he added.
“During the violence, a large number of patients were kept on the floor as our beds are limited. We don’t say no to anyone. If anyone came to us we tried to give him/her treatment,” he said.
He said, “We can easily manage huge number of patients but the problem is to handle the relatives and viewers, who come with the patients.”
BNP standing committee member Mahbubur Rahman said those who were involved with these kinds of sabotage activists should be punished. Government should bring them to book irrespective of their political identity.
Advocate Salma Ali, Executive Director of the Bangladesh National Women Lawyers Association (BNWLA), said, “It is unacceptable that children are being killed or injured as a result of political violence.”
“It was regrettable that children were being used in the acts of violence for political gains,” he added.
Swapan Kumar Topadar, Deputy Director (Hospital) of Directorate General of Health Services, said, “As far as we know burn and plastic surgery unit of DMCH successfully managed all the burn patients, who came during the period of political violence.”
