Nightmarish experience

I was with my younger brother in a house in Kalabagan on that ill-fated day. We were listening to a BBC Bengali programme. At 8.10pm, I decided to return to my university hall. There was no bus running at that time on that route. I also failed to get a rickshaw. So I started walking. Everywhere there was a feeling of fear. I had to walk through the Elephant Road, a longer course for me, instead of the Nilkhet-Newmarket Road, because there was a rumour that there was trouble in Dhaka College area. While passing Kantabon, I suddenly recalled that my only friends in Dhaka, Uzzal and Sohag, always stay at Ramna Park till 9.30. I became worried about them. So I decided to go to Ramna. When I came to TSC, I thought I would first visit the DMCH and then I would go to find my friend Sohag. This was the first time I witnessed a bomb blast in Dhaka. So I went there, but now I think it was a wrong decision. That visit left me with a scar deep within. I was confident that I would not react much seeing dead bodies and the injured. I entered the DMCH full of people ,some crying, some weeping. At last, I found the room where they kept the dead bodies . I had to stand in a queue to enter that room. What a horrific scene! Nine dead bodies were lying their. I left that room as quickly as I could, but punishment for me was not over. I went to visit the wounded in block-29,30,35. A patient in Ward-30 was given a bed in floor. He was bleeding from his mouth. A nurse was crying, "Who are his relatives, please hold him." Because he could not keep himself in bed.

The doctors and nurses were busy with tired, worried and frustrated faces. I could not remain there for a long time. I don't remember how I left that place.

I will never forget what I saw at the DMCH on that day.