At least 672 incidents of major launch capsize, the latest one on Monday, have taken a staggering 6,000 human lives over the past 20 years.
Although investigation committees are formed immediately after any launch capsize, most of the reports do not see light, and culprits responsible for the deaths and casualties remain unidentified.
According to information received from different sources concerned, accidents in waterways seem to have become unstoppable due to reckless driving and various other irregularities dominating the sector.
On Monday, a small launch capsized when a giant launch rammed it resulting in the deaths of at least 34 people, including women and children, at Shyambazar near the Sadarghat Launch Terminal.
Such types of accidents are taking place almost every day at different places across the country. But, the people responsible for the incidents are not getting punished due to unknown reasons.
In some cases, investigation reports have been submitted with various recommendations so that the culprits get punished and such types of incidents could be avoided. But, there are allegations that neither the culprits get punished nor those recommendations implemented.
Culprits are not getting punishment for their political identities or illegal monetary transactions. The owners and drivers also do not obey the rules for the same reasons. This is why the launch staffers, including drivers, do not maintain rules and obey the directives. In these circumstances, passengers and even the entire waterway sector has now become helpless. Besides, incidents of launch capsizes and deaths of hundreds of people are taking place almost everyday
Experts of the water way sector said they have so far identified at least 15 reasons for incidents of launch capsize. These 15 causes have been identified through research and statistics conducted by different government and non-governmental agencies.
According to them, the main cause behind launch capsize is faulty design of the water vessels, the second one is unskilled drivers, third is negligence by the master or sukani of the launch, fourth is the carrying of passengers twice to thrice more than capacity, fifth is disobeying of the safety and security laws, sixth is having no search light in the launch, seventh is competition among the launches, eighth is reckless driving, ninth is having no knowledge about the weather forecast, tenth is not keeping enough number of lifebuoys for the passengers, another is not keeping carbon-dioxide cylinders, technical faults and no fitness. Besides, lack of preparation during the journey on different occasions or festivals while fishermen also do not use any beacon lights on the river.
Experts said unless these problems are solved, incidents of launch capsizes and deaths of hundreds of people will continue to increase.
They said neither the owners and employees of launches nor the officials of the water sector could avoid responsibility for such types of accidents.
Atiqul Islam, Deputy Inspector General of River Police, said they often hold meetings with launch owners, drivers and other staffers.
“We always request them to maintain the rules and regulations. But, many of them do not bother to heed our requests”, said the DIG and continued saying that they would go for tougher action if their requests are not entertained in future.
DIG Atiqul Islam also said they would not allow any unskilled driver and staffers in any launch in future and also take strict measures so that no such kind of tragic incident takes place anymore.
