ROAD TRANSPORT Minister Obaidul Quader told reporters on Wednesday that the body headed by Bangladesh Road Transport Authority’s (BRTA) Director (Administration) Mashiur Rahman has been directed to file its report by three working days. The former Chief Editor of state news agency, Bangladesh Sangbad Sangstha (BSS), Zaglul Ahmed Chowdhury died Saturday after falling off a moving bus in capital Dhaka’s Karwan Bazar area.
A witness, Imrul Qayes said, Chowdhury fell to the ground while getting off the bus at the busy intersection. Qayes was one of those who rushed the journalist to the nearby Mohona Clinic at Panthapath. “There was blood coming out of his nose and ears at the time,” he commented to a local daily.”After keeping the critically injured man there for at least 45 minutes, doctors of that clinic said they would not be able to treat him.”
“Then we rushed him to Comfort Hospital where the doctors declared him dead,” Qayes said.
Quoting the doctors, police mentioned that Chowdhury had died from internal haemorrhage. Chowdhury, 65, with a career in journalism spanning nearly four decades, was last working as a consulting editor of The Financial Express, said his long-time colleague Daily Ittefaq’s Special Correspondent Mainul Alam.
While no doubt the report will find out that the bus driver was at fault and instruct the police to find and arrest him without fail, the incident once again brings to the mind the colossal failure of the government in maintaining roads and communication networks properly. It is only in Bangladesh that bus and other vehicles called human haulers think of roads as the property of their fathers, to do with as they please. They rush along madly on the roads, stopping and speeding as they will, without a care for either their passengers or the pedestrians. The passengers are pushed out or forced in, not treating as worth human consideration, thinking everybody is cargo.
Their actions, while seemingly insane, have a method to their madness. The drivers know that no driver has been prosecuted for any number of time for road accidents, so if people die they don’t have to spend any length of time in prison. Secondly, the drivers have unions who have the backing of powerful leaders and they know that even prosecuting them will be very difficult. Then powerful people are owners of the buses and bus drivers do not have to worry for flouting the law.
The solutions to the problems are very simple – do not allow the buses to run like racing cars with no speed limit. The buses do not stop fully even for the passengers to get in or get off.
The journalists are demanding punishment for the death of their fellow journalist Zaglul Ahmed Chowdhury. The real persons to be punished are the authorities who allow buses drivers not to respect the laws. Get rid of incompetent and corrupt officials if it is possible.
