Heart-rending scene at Hamim's home

I know these stories happen often especially in Third World countries watching this interview really got to me

Call for effective road safety law

Watching cartoon films and Spider-Man show was Hamim's favourite pastimes; he would plead with his father for a car he had set his heart on to get to school; he would remain awake until late night for his father's return; all these are now only memories to his shell-shocked parents.

Hamim was crushed to death under the wheels of a bus just in front of Willes Little Flower School as he was returning home from his school with his mother on Wednesday.

"Papa, would you buy me a car so that I can go to school by it?" Mohammad Motaleb quoted his son Hamim as saying often. "Hamim wouldn't sleep unless I returned home from business at night," he added.

Since the day of accident Hamim's mother Sonia Sheikh has been speechless with a blank look in her eyes.

"Sonia grabs the T-shirt of Hamim and, in a fit of hysteria, bursts into sobs saying: 'My Hamim...Hamim...come son...come and sleep by my side'," said Hamim's grandmother Afsana Begum at their residence in Suritola in the old part of the city.

The sombre silence in the house was broken as Samia Halim, who lost his 20-year-old son Saif Ahmed Arnab in a road accident, along with Arnab's aunt lawmaker Tarana Halim arrived at Hamim's house. Wailing, weeping and sobbing were all; even an onlooker couldn't help crying.

Saif Ahmed Arnab was also killed in a road accident in the city's Rampura around two months back.

None of the visitors could hold back their tears when one of the relatives took out a photograph of six-year-old Hamim.

Hamim's grandmother Afsana Begum said Sonia had not been able to eat anything or sleep even for a moment for the last two days even after taking injection and sleeping pills.

"We have no words to console her," she said, adding that relatives, teachers from Hamim's school and neighbours are pouring into the house but none can help Sonia with food.

"Please do something so that no kids die in road accidents like my Hamim," Hamim's father Motaleb's cry pierced the air as he went on to say: "Who will wait for me now?"

Samia Halim in an emotion-choked voice said, "After I lost my son I turned into a living corpse. Even death was better for me than being alive. Arnab was preparing to go to Australia for studying his BBA but all dreams of my family were shattered with his premature demise."

She said she had passed sleepless night almost every day since Arnab's death.

"How can I live a life like this...why did he have to get killed? It is now better for me to die," Samia said, "I want to see the end of such deaths. No more kids should meet such tragic death."

Lawmaker Tarana Halim and her relatives are trying to wage a social movement to prevent road accidents.

Tarana said she would make every effort to make a comprehensive road safety law where there would be no loopholes through which any criminal can go unpunished. The criminals should get life sentence.

"These children are of well-off families. If these families don't get justice what about the others?" she said, adding, "We must stand tall."

When the evening was spreading out against the sky the reporters rose to leave but a suppressed sobbing held them back, "My nephew would never ask for a bicycle ride...who will ask me at night if I have a dinner or not?" Hamim's uncle Riazuddin Shiplu began to cry uncontrollably.

Human Chain

Teachers and students of Willes Little Flower School, family and relatives of Hamim and rights activists will form a human chain in front of the school at 11:00am tomorrow demanding safe roads and punishment to the driver responsible for Hamim's death.

Shamsur Rahman, the driver of the killer bus who was on a remand, will be produced before the court today.

http://www.thedailystar.net/newDesig...php?nid=125095