The negligence of Prothom Alo, which claimed the life of Naimul Abrar, cannot be accepted at all.
Prothom Alo management did not take him to hospital in time. Leaving the renowned Suhrawardy Hospital which is just opposite the road, they took him to one Universal Hospital in Shahbagh delaying three hours.
Classmates of 15-year old Naimul Abrar, a 9th grader student of Dhaka Residential Model College, came up with the allegation while talking to Bangladesh Post on Saturday morning.
Mentionable, Naimul died of being electrocuted while participating in a cultural programme, a concert titled ‘Kianondo-2019’, organised by Kishore Alo, an ancillary of daily Prothom Alo, at Dhaka Residential Model School on Friday evening.
His grieving classmates and other students who participated in the programme strongly condemned the negligence of Kishore Alo management, saying, “They even did not stop the concert, even after knowing that a student has died.”
The concerned was organised marking the sixth founding anniversary of Kishor Alo (KiA), a magazine of daily Prothom Alo for juveniles.
On the sudden death, his classmates started protesting in front of the school with four-point demand on Saturday. A good number of parents also joined with them.
Grade 11 student Ehteshmul placed the four points demand to the Principal Brigadier General Kazi Shamim Farhad on behalf of the students.
The four points demand includes—releasing CCTV footage of the incident within 72 hours; acknowledging mismanagement of the event, the program organizers, KiA, and hospital authority should give a written statement; report of the investigation committee must be made public within 72 hours and not only as an accident, a statement should be published in the newspaper mentioning the negligence, mismanagement, and apathy of the authorities.
As per the witnesses’ statements, it was learned that, Abrar got electrocuted when the program was going on, when he was taken to Universal Medical Hospital, the doctor on duty declared him dead.
His classmates stated that, if authority concerned would have taken him to nearby Suhrawardy hospital he may have had a chance to survive, on the other hand, KiA authority continued the programme hiding the incident.
When the news of Naimul Abrar’s death spread, his classmates along with other parents staged a protest at night.
One of his classmate said, “He was still alive when he was taken by ambulance, the authority concerned did not even inform the college authority of his parents about this accident. Within the night his dead body was sent to his village house after the funeral procession”.
According to medical authority statement, some people brought him at the emergency department at around 4 pm on Friday. The hospital doctor on duty after necessary examination declared him dead.
Mohammadpur Police Station OC GG Biswas said, based on the family request, Police transferred the body to the family without post-mortem examination. His father filed an unnatural death case at the station.
On the magazine’s Facebook page, Kishor Alo Editor Anisul Hoque wrote that Nayeem was electrocuted after he came to watch the programme. He was taken to an emergency medical camp there and attended by two FCPS doctors who recommended taking him to a hospital immediately, Doctors declared Abrar dead when he was taken there.
