Contractor assaults PWD engineer

A contractor and his associate attacked an engineer of Public Works Department in Rajshahi yesterday, leaving him injured and his office vandalised.

Delwar Hossain, a sub-assistant engineer of PWD's Division-2, was admitted to Rajshahi Medical College Hospital with cut wounds over his left eye and hand, said OC Shahadat Hossain Khan of Rajpara Police Station.

The attackers -- contractor Shahabul Manjur Liton and his associate Atikur Rahman -- were arrested from the scene where they were confined by PWD staff, the OC said.

The attackers beat Delwar with a wooden chair for allegedly suspending an ongoing construction work due to use of low quality construction materials and ignoring conditions, the OC said, quoting Delwar and his colleagues. They also damaged a laptop, printer, and furniture.

Delwar's colleague and sub-divisional engineer AAM Iftakhar Mazid filed a case with Rajpara Police Station.

Talking to this newspaper, Mazid said the attack occurred around noon when the two went to Delwar's office and locked in an altercation with him. PWD staffers rescued Delwar and sent him to the hospital, kept the attackers confined and called police.

Delwar told reporters that on Sunday afternoon he went to inspect a site in Puthia where construction works of a land office was underway at the cost of Tk 1 crore. He spotted low quality brick chips being used and the contractor was not following directions to complete work as per schedule.

This correspondent could not get the contractor's version, as he has been arrested.

Contacted, the OC said the contractor told police that he went to the engineer's office for restarting the work, but the engineer refused, which led to an altercation.