This time a two-and-a half-year old boy is fighting for life at the intensive care unit (ICU) of the City Hospital in the capital after he received burn injury in an arson attack.
The fire burnt around 17% area of the boy named Safir. He is the only son of Dr Saiful Islam and Dr Sharmin Ahmed.
Safir was going back home in Narayanganj by a public bus. As the bus reached the Somoboy Market located at Chasara of Narayanganj last Sunday around 9pm some pickets hurled petrol bombs at it.
When Sharmin scrambled out of the bus with her beloved son wrapped in her lap the fire had already burnt Safir’s face, hands and legs.
Dr Sharmin too received 38% and her husband Dr Saiful 5% burn injuries.
They were first admitted to 300-bed Narayanganj Hospital and later transferred to the City Hospital.
All of them are now undergoing treatment at the hospital in Mohammadpur area.
Visiting the hospital, yesterday even-ing, this correspondent found Sharmin and Saiful undergoing treatment in hospital cabins while Safir at the ICU.
Doctors of the hospital say they could not say anything about Safir before he passed at least 72 hours. Till then he was not out of danger.
Dr Sharmin of Anowar Khan Modern Hospital, whose face, head, some portion of waist and two hands were burnt are also not out of danger.
Most of the times she keeps lying on bed. But when she starts talking she only talks about her son – “where is my beloved son? where is he? how is he? Is he all right?”
Moshiur Rahman, uncle of Safiur, said a couple of weeks back Safir’s two legs were burnt from hot water and he was undergoing treatment at the burn and plastic surgery unit of Dhaka Medical College Hospital (DMCH).
Last Sunday, after treatment, while he was going back to Narayanganj with his parents pickets set fire to the passenger bus they were on, he said.
Of them, Dr Saiful’s condition is a little better. With tears welling up in his eyes he said: “What would I say? Everything seems like a nightmare. Heaven forbid that such tragedy strikes any parents.”
Faruk Hosssain Khan, uncle of Sharmin, says apart from burn injury Sharmin’s hands also got injured as she jumped off the bus.
Sharmin, who is not able to see his son as she can not walk, always sobs uncontrollably as the fire incident keeps crossing her mind. She keeps enquiring about her son’s condition.
Apart from the couple and their son, 17 more people are now undergoing treatment at the burn institute of the DMCH.
