Shaheen Mollah

When buses were being torched in Dhaka on November 12 afternoon, Zakir Hossain Siddiqui, a vice-president of Jubo Dal, was undergoing treatment for a blood disease at LabAid Hospital.

Hazrat Ali was selling grocery items at his shop on the first floor of Shegunbagicha kitchen market when a bus was set alight near Aziz Super Market in the capital’s Shabagh area around 1:40pm on Thursday.

Police checkposts stand just before the entrance of Mohammadpur Geneva Camp. A few steps into the camp, it’s the same old sight that used to be seen at the notorious drug den of the capital before the 2018 anti-narcotics crackdown.

The recent move by Dhaka South City Corporation to “reform” the city’s waste collection has not fared well with citizens, who say they are being charged excessively by the newly-appointed contractors, and the service is substandard.

Many stores in the capital have stopped selling potatoes over the last few days after the authorities fixed the prices and began to penalise overcharging sellers.

Dhaka Medical College Hospital (DMCH) has set up a mass casualty management centre to handle influx of patients due to disastrous incidents like Rana Plaza or Nimtoli tragedies.

Kohinur Begum (57) came to the capital 25 years ago with her husband, who was a rickshaw puller, and four sons from Bhola, as their house was destroyed by the nearby river.

With suspended ward councillor Erfan Salim behind bars, locals in Debidas Ghat Lane of the capital’s Chawkbazar are still afraid to talk out about his illegal activities.

It had nearly been an hour, but Khadiza Khatun was still moving from vendor to vendor with her empty bazaar bag in Tejgaon kitchen market.

Let’s take the example of Sufia Khatun, 65, a resident of Dhanmondi in the capital. She had suffered a heart attack in 2018 and saw doctors both in Bangladesh and India and was on medication prescribed by a cardiologist in Delhi. Torsemide was working well.

Lutfur Rahman, a resident of Shuritola, never thought he would reach such a point in his life where he would have to purchase essentials from a government subsidised OMS truck. But there he was yesterday, standing in a long queue leading up to a truck that came to his area.

For the last one month, Akbar Hossain has been torn between two difficult choices: send his wife and children to the village or reduce the amount of money he sends his elderly parents.

Hundreds of people are seen waiting restlessly outside the Sheikh Hasina National Institute of Burn and Plastic Surgery in Dhaka after the blast in a Narayanganj mosque which has claimed 12 lives so far.

The government has made little progress in relocating hazardous chemical businesses and warehouses from Old Dhaka, leaving the residents in constant fear following the two devastating fire incidents that claimed over 200 lives.

In Arshad Hasan’s 100 square feet apartment at Mirpur section-11’s Bihari camp, there’s barely enough room for his family of four.

The outdoor department of Dhaka Medical College Hospital (DMCH) is going through an expansion. Hospital authorities expect to start providing service from the expanded outdoor premise within one-and-a-half months.

Contradicting the police account, family members of two of the suspects arrested in connection with the explosion at Pallabi Police Station said they were detained two days before the incident.

With only a day remaining before Eid-ul-Azha, selling of sacrificial animals is yet to gain momentum at the markets in the capital.

Ignoring suggestions of the National Technical Advisory Committee (NTAC) on Covid-19, 18 cattle markets were set up in the capital with a promise to maintain health guidelines as a preventive measure against the pandemic.

Every year before Eid-ul-Azha, the cattle markets bustle with people; excitement fills the air while haggling commences in full force. The smelly, yet lively haats are the place to be; the animals -- sights to behold.