Staff Reporter :
The High Court on Wednesday issued a rule upon the concerned bodies of the government to explain as to why they should not be directed to compensate Tk 50 million to the family of five people who were crushed to death when a girder of the Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) project fell on their car in Dhaka’s Uttara.
Secretary of Road Transport and Highways Department, Chairman and Managing Director of BRT Company, Project Director of the project and Coordinator of the contracting firm China Gezhouba Group Corporation (CGGC) have been asked to comply with the rule.
At the same time, the BRT project authorities has been asked to give a report within 60 days about the measures taken by them for the safety of the people in the development project area in the last 5 years.
The High Court bench of Justice Farah Mahbub and Justice Ahmed Sohel passed the order after hearing a writ petition filed seeking compensation for the victim family.
On August 15, a heavy girder lifted by a crane under the government project fell down on a passing car on Uttara’s Jashimuddin Road, killing five members of a family. The car’s owner Rubel Mia, 60, his wife Fahima, 40, Fahima’s sister Jharna, 28, and Jharna’s two children, Jannat, 6, and Zakaria, 2, died in the incident.
Among widespread criticism, a Supreme Court lawyer, Zakaria Khan, filed a writ petition with the High Court seeking compensation worth Tk 50 million for the family of five people who were crushed to death.
Lawyer ABM Shahjahan Akanda Masum filed the petition on behalf of his colleague Zakaria Khan on Tuesday.
Lawyer Shahjahan Akanda Masum appeared in the court hearing on behalf of the petitioner.
An initial inquiry has found evidence of negligence by China Gezhouba Group Corporation or CGGC, the contractor in charge of the crane that dropped a concrete girder on the car. A case was started against Gezhouba and safety officers on the site by the victims’ family on Tuesday.
