Old Dhaka fire: NSU student dies on eve of sister’s wedding

For the past few days Rohan had been busy finishing up preparations for his sister’s wedding. On Wednesday night he and four of his friends were going around on their motorcycles to complete some last-minute purchases for the wedding.

But now the student from the North South University's Business Administration programme is dead, one of the many victims of the fire at Old Dhaka’s Chawkbazar.

His friend, Arafat, an ‘A’ Level student from Willes Little Flower School was another victim of the blaze. Arafat had lived near Dhaka’s Kazi Alauddin Road.

According to the Dhaka Medical College Hospital authority, 67 bodies have been brought to the hospital from the blaze that broke out in Chawkbazar on Wednesday night.

The friends and family of Rohan and Arafat are at the Dhaka Medical morgue, but are having trouble identifying the two of them.

Rohan’s cousin, shirt trader Momin Khan said:

“We were told that Rohan’s body was at the morgue, but we cannot find him.”

Businessman Mohammad Wajed, who came from Agamasi Lane, said Rohan and Arafat had been travelling with his nephew Moinul Islam Labib, Ramiz and Shohag. 

Labib, Ramiz and Shohag were on one motorcycle while Rohan and Arafat were on another, he said.

Wajed said that Labib had survived with a burn on one part of his head. Arafat and Rohan had both died after their motorcycle caught on fire, he said.

Rohan’s father, Md Hassan Khan, came to the morgue on Thursday afternoon, but was in no condition to give a statement.

His father-in-law, Yunus Khan, said that the wedding of Rohan’s younger sister was scheduled for March. Rohan and his friends had busied themselves with the preparations, he said.

“Rohan and his friends had gone to the area to discuss the community centre for the wedding and the decorations and to make some purchases. They were caught in the fire.”