2 children missing in Ctg boat capsize
A father’s affection knows no bounds. One such father is Harun-ur-Rashid who drowned trying to save his two children after a boat capsize in the river Karnaphuli in Chittagong Wednesday evening.
The bodies of the three could not be traced yet though a rescue operation has been on since the incident. Harun, 40, along with his wife Parvin Akter, 30, daughter Ishrat, 9, and sons Miraj, 4, and Maruf, 12, had been returning home in the port city after enjoying Eid vacations in Chandanaish upazila of the district, family sources said.
They took a bus ride from Chandanaish to the port city and then hired a boat at Bridgeghat around 7:45pm to reach their Sadarghat residence.
However, when the boat was halfway across the river Karnaphuli, a goods-laden engine boat struck it around 8:15pm, throwing them into the water, witnesses said.
The boatman managed to get to the shore carrying Miraj while Parvin herself could swim ashore. Harun held the two children and struggled to swim across the river but soon the three drowned, the survivors said.
“Harun was a very good swimmer,” said his brother Md Mamun while searching for the trio in the river along with coast guard personnel and local people yesterday.
“He put himself in danger to save his children.”
Zafar Ahmed, president of Bridgeghat Shampan Malik Kalyan Samiti, filed a case with Karnaphuli Police Station in connection with the incident. Police seized the goods-laden boat but its crew fled.
The goods-laden engine boat did not have any signal light and had been driven by the helper of its boatman, he said quoting witnesses.
Mirza Sayem Ahmed, assistant commissioner (Kotwali zone) of Chittagong Metropolitan Police, said the boat had capsized at a time when the tide was ebbing and that was why Harun and his children could not be rescued.
-With The Daily Star input
