Child murdered at a hospital!
Monday, 9 January 2012
Neil Ray
She came from Hazaribagh to Dhaka Medical College and Hospital (DMCH) on Monday last for medical treatment but left it a bereaved mother. The two and a half years daughter Ishrat was no patient but her mother brought her along because there was none to whose care she could leave her loving daughter at home. But if she would have the remotest idea of what was going to happen to the girl in the country's premier medical college hospital, she would not only not have brought the innocent soul but also refrained from seeking medical attention there. Within just 10 minutes, the time she stayed in the physician's room for a check-up, the moving light of her life was extinguished by ugly and cruel hands. The girl's life was snapped in mysterious circumstances. Her body was discovered on the landing of the second floor staircase.
How this could happen at a hospital like DMCH at a time when it is at its busiest is simply baffling. When the mother was about to enter the doctor's chamber with her daughter, a man and a woman claiming to be members of the security staff told her not to take the girl inside. So she had to leave the girl to their care before entering the chamber. On coming out of the room, she found her daughter nowhere, nor were there the 'security man and woman'. After long four hours, she rushed to the second floor staircase landing hearing that there lay a body of a girl and to confirm her worst fear she discovered that it was none other than her own little darling's lifeless mortal remains.
A little girl of two and a half years old cannot do anything in the world to inspire in the darkest soul the bizarre motive to kill her. If it is related to anything, most likely it would be someone's grudge borne against her parents. But only the most calculative and diabolic daredevils can think of committing such a vengeful act in a public hospital at such busy hours. Ishrat's parents requested that their child's body were spared of the autopsy. Simple folks, they may be convinced of the futility of such post-mortem examinations or the following case procedures or they may have their own special reasons.
Yet the hospital certainly has to do a lot of explaining, more so because on the same day three children including Ishrat were missing from the hospital. Two of them were found. The hospital, among many of its infamous records, has to its unenviable credit several incidents involving stealing of new-born babies. Even an organised gang in the guise of hospital attendants was detected to be engaged in the heinous act of child lifting a few years ago. Vested interest groups were so powerful that the authorities dared not confront them head on. That situation has changed but cleaning of the Augean stable is yet to be complete.
In the interest of law and justice as also the image of the hospital, there is a need for bringing to book the murderer/s of Ishrat. Prima facie evidence, as corroborated by the operation officer of the Shahbagh police station, suggests the girl was murdered.
She came from Hazaribagh to Dhaka Medical College and Hospital (DMCH) on Monday last for medical treatment but left it a bereaved mother. The two and a half years daughter Ishrat was no patient but her mother brought her along because there was none to whose care she could leave her loving daughter at home. But if she would have the remotest idea of what was going to happen to the girl in the country's premier medical college hospital, she would not only not have brought the innocent soul but also refrained from seeking medical attention there. Within just 10 minutes, the time she stayed in the physician's room for a check-up, the moving light of her life was extinguished by ugly and cruel hands. The girl's life was snapped in mysterious circumstances. Her body was discovered on the landing of the second floor staircase.
How this could happen at a hospital like DMCH at a time when it is at its busiest is simply baffling. When the mother was about to enter the doctor's chamber with her daughter, a man and a woman claiming to be members of the security staff told her not to take the girl inside. So she had to leave the girl to their care before entering the chamber. On coming out of the room, she found her daughter nowhere, nor were there the 'security man and woman'. After long four hours, she rushed to the second floor staircase landing hearing that there lay a body of a girl and to confirm her worst fear she discovered that it was none other than her own little darling's lifeless mortal remains.
A little girl of two and a half years old cannot do anything in the world to inspire in the darkest soul the bizarre motive to kill her. If it is related to anything, most likely it would be someone's grudge borne against her parents. But only the most calculative and diabolic daredevils can think of committing such a vengeful act in a public hospital at such busy hours. Ishrat's parents requested that their child's body were spared of the autopsy. Simple folks, they may be convinced of the futility of such post-mortem examinations or the following case procedures or they may have their own special reasons.
Yet the hospital certainly has to do a lot of explaining, more so because on the same day three children including Ishrat were missing from the hospital. Two of them were found. The hospital, among many of its infamous records, has to its unenviable credit several incidents involving stealing of new-born babies. Even an organised gang in the guise of hospital attendants was detected to be engaged in the heinous act of child lifting a few years ago. Vested interest groups were so powerful that the authorities dared not confront them head on. That situation has changed but cleaning of the Augean stable is yet to be complete.
In the interest of law and justice as also the image of the hospital, there is a need for bringing to book the murderer/s of Ishrat. Prima facie evidence, as corroborated by the operation officer of the Shahbagh police station, suggests the girl was murdered.