Team News Riveting
Dhaka, March 7
At least 17 people were killed and more than 140 injured in a powerful explosion that ripped a building in Dhaka’s Gulistan area Tuesday evening.
The explosion took place around 4.45 pm near the BRTC bus counter. A five-storey building on the south side of the Gulistan BRTC counter, housing a sanitary shop on the ground floor and Brac Bank office on the remaining floors were affected by the blast.
A seven-storey sanitary market building also stand next to it. None of the buildings collapsed, the officials said.
Deputy Director of Fire Service Dinomoni Sharma told the media that the explosion took place in a building at 180/1 Holding, North South Road. A bus parked on the opposite side of the building was also damaged due to the blast.
Eleven firefighting units are working at the scene to carry out a rescue operation, said Rashed Bin Khaled, duty officer of the fire service control room.
DMCH Director Brig Gen Nazmul Haque told reporters, “It’s a massive explosion. We are trying our best to help the injured and their relatives.” He said that numbers of doctors have been increased to 50 at the hospital’s emergency department.
Dhaka Metropolitan Police commissioner Khandker Golam Faruq has said the incident of explosion in Gulistan area seemed to be an accident and not an act of sabotage.
“Primarily we are suspecting that it is an accident. Different units are working to find out whether it was sabotage. So far, no evidence of sabotage was found at the spot till now. The law enforcement agencies are investigating it,” he said while talking to the reporters at Dhaka Medical College Hospital.
The incident took place within days of a blast at an oxygen plant in Chattogram’s Sitakundu and a market in Dhaka’s science lab area in which six people were killed.
