The death toll in Sunday evening’s launch disaster has reached 29. A BIWTA rescue vessel on Monday pulled the capsized launch out of water. The Munshiganj-bound launch, carrying over 50 passengers, sank near the third Shitalakkhya Bridge at Koylaghat of Syedpur area when it was hit by a tanker.
Launch disaster has become a regular feature for one reason or the other. The ordinary people’s lives have no security and they die helplessly with nobody to bear responsibility. The question may be asked about whether safety measures were followed to make travelling by the particular launch safe, but satisfactory answer was not to be expected.
Every time such an accident occurs the department concerned orders inquiry, often by those officials whose negligence of duty is directly or indirectly responsible for the same; gets a report, shifts the responsibility onto others and shelves it. Nothing happens. With the passage of time, the people forget the incident until the next one occurs. The authorities concerned never come under public accountability for their responsibilities. The minister concerned remains high above for taking responsibility and explaining that there was no negligence.
The main causes of launch disasters in our country leading to such colossal loss of life and property have been identified many a time. These are: faulty design of vessels, structural weakness, lack of adequate safety measures, lack of adequate supervision by a competent authority during the construction of water transport vessels, absence of the qualified crew, obtaining of fitness certificate through unfair means, overloading, disregard of weather forecasts, and negligence of duty by water vessels’ crew. A survey also revealed that almost 60% of these motor launches are unfit to ply because they are not built in accordance with the standards of shipbuilding.
Faulty design and failure of its haul contributed to sinking of the vessel. The weather was fine. The river was calm. Even if the vessel had collided with the other vessel for one reason or the other, it would not have sunk instantly if it was built in accordance with the standard requirements of shipbuilding. Even in case of accidents there have to be life saving gear in a sunken vessel. Even if it did sink due to accident the loss of life would have been minimal had the vessel operators complied with standard safety requirements.
Unfortunately we have a government that got elected by using police against the people so it to be expected that the whole machinery would be uncaring of the people. So we can only mourn for the dead ones and pray for their eternal peace.
