Money was saved to marry daughters off, pay for surgery. Families lose everything in Chattogram slum fire

Sohagi Das and her neighbour Birjit Das saved money for their daughters’ weddings, while Sugondha Das kept money for her daughter’s tumour operation

Sohagi Das stood on a pile of burnt-down bamboo and tin sheets, the remnants of the shanty she once called home.

“My younger daughter’s wedding was scheduled to be held in Baishakh if everything went according to plan. I skipped meals and saved Tk 62,000. There were gold ornaments weighing 1 Bhori (11.664 grams). I’ve lost everything in the fire,” a heartbroken Sohagi said.

The blaze, suspected to have sparked from a short-circuit, ripped through Tekpara and Yakub Nagar slums in Chattogram’s Firingi Bazar on Monday afternoon, burning down nearly 200 shanties.

The marginal families in these shanties live mostly off fishing and doing odd jobs.

Sohagi works at the Chattogram City Corporation as a daily wager. She and her husband were at work when the fire broke out while their younger daughter rushed out to save her life without taking anything along.

“Even that money wasn’t enough for the wedding. I would need help from others. Now everything is lost. Even the in-laws of my elder daughter visited us yesterday [Sunday]. How shall I marry off my other daughter?” wailed Sohagi.

Sugondha Das, who works at Bandar Hospital after the death of her husband, saved Tk 50,000 for an operation to remove a tumour from her daughter’s belly.

“She has been at the hospital for 14 days. I was supposed to take her to another doctor outside the hospital in the afternoon but brought her here after hearing about the fire. Everything had been burnt before we arrived,” she said.

Her daughter still had the cannula in her hand. “The documents of my daughter’s treatment are also gone with the money. This fire has destroyed everything we had,” Sugondha said.

Their neighbour Birjit Das, a fishing trawler driver, lived on the ground floor of a four-storey building in the middle of the slums.

He kept Tk 200,000 in an iron almirah for his daughter’s wedding. Everything inside the almirah has been burnt after the blaze melted the iron. Another almirah belonging to his brother-in-law in the building met the same fate. It had another Tk 300,000 stashed away for the wedding.

His wife Shilpi Das, a city corporation worker, said: “We had saved the money despite suffering for the wedding. My younger daughters wanted new dresses for Pahela Baishakh, but we didn’t buy them any. Now we don’t have anything but the dresses we are wearing.”