22 February 2019•Update: 23 February 2019
By Md. Kamruzzaman
DHAKA, Bangladesh
Rubina Yasmin is carrying a photograph of her missing son outside a morgue in Dhaka where bodies from a deadly fire have arrived.
She kisses the picture crying uncontrollably as her husband tries to console her.
Her son, Tanjil Hasan Rohan, a private university student, was a victim of Wednesday’s fire that spread through several apartment blocks and roads in an old and congested part of the city killing 70 people.
Some 67 bodies arrived at Dhaka Medical College Hospital morgue of which 46 were handed over to relatives, while 21 have been sent for DNA test to aid in identification, District Commissioner Abu Saleh Mohammad Ferdaus Khan told Anadolu Agency.
He added that some other bodies were mangled and beyond recognition.
Blood samples from relatives of 14 unidentified bodies have been taken but DNA verification may take up to a month, said Mohammad Riazul Haq, superintendent of criminal investigation department of police.
Dozens of families who lost their loved ones are waiting for the remains of their loved ones.
Lal Mia, 80, lost her son, daughter-in-law grandson. All three are missing.
Fariha Taslim, 11, lost her father, a small trader, who was having tea with his friends on the roadside that night.
The government has formed a team to investigate the incident.
According to preliminary findings of the fire service, a fire blazing out from a private car on the road spread instantly to an adjacent multistorey building where amount of chemical substances was kept in "unsafe conditions".
The latest inferno brings back memories of a 2010 fire that killed 124 people, putting pressure on once again to remove unsafe chemical warehouses from Dhaka's old areas.
Dhaka South City Mayor Sayeed Khokon told reporters on Thursday that all chemical warehouses will be removed from the area immediately.
