\\\'Compensation no relief\\\'

Families of railway security staff who suffered death or injury during pre-poll violence are looking for jobs, not financial compensation. They say that compensation only brings some relief for a while. For several months in the rundown to the January 5 general elections, the railways were hit by systematic and targeted violence and acts of sabotage during nationwide nonstop blockades and hartals. Many guarding railway assets suffered death or debilitating injuries. Some of their family members received financial compensation from Railways Minister Md Mazibul Hoque at the ministry’s conference room last week. That is when they asked for regular jobs for family members, saying compensation was a temporary relief. Wounded Ansar personnel Azadur Rahman’s wife Tahmina came to receive the compensation last Thursday from her native Parbhaibanipur village in Bogra’s Sherpur Upazila. Rahman lost a leg and an eye during an attack allegedly by opposition activists while on duty at Bogra’s Shahjahanpur Railways Station on December 2 last year. His wife, Tahmina, while receiving a cheque Tk 200,000 as compensation, sniffled. She told bdnews24.com: “I have also received a Tk 300,000 compensation from Ansar-VDP besides this TK 200,000 from the railways. But it is no relief because I know this will last only for a while. My husband is in no position to work, so I wonder how I will run the family and what will happen to my son.”