It would have been funny but for the deplorable business practice: buy a hilsa, get marbles free.
That, however, is precisely what happened on Tuesday to one Mashreful Islam Saikat, a student of Barisal Sher-e-Bangla Medical College and vice-president of the Chhatra Kalyan Parishad (students’ union). While buying his morning quota of four fish from Shahin Hilsa Fish Centre on Tuesday morning, little did Saikat imagine he would find anything but quality slices of the fish. He was wrong — after the fish were cut, he found 26 marbles from each hilsa, sources in Detective Branch (DB) police said. Armed with frustration, and the cut fish, Saikat went back to the market and complained to the seller, who denied having sold fish with marbled inside. According to sources, a DB police team was at the spot at the moment and as Saikat challenged the fish vendors, the cops made the fish seller cut two more big hilsas.
Marbles were found in both.
The police later arrested the salesman from the fish centre — one named Abdul Jalal. Sources said a section of wholesalers are involved in putting marbles or small stone chips to increase the weight of export-size hilsas.
Inspector Md Jahangir of DB Police said preparations are on to file a case and probe it further.
-With The Independent input
