Innocent citizens and organised criminals
On the 15th of this month, when my daughter-in-law and her son came back from abroad, a heartrending incident occurred. Their arrival at Zia International Airport was after midnight. My son went to receive them, and the driver was on the wheel. Since the driver lives in Gazipur and we live in Gulshan, my son decided to drop him near the bus stop a little distance away from the airport, thinking he would reach home quicker. There the driver got into a baby-taxi ready to leave with three other passengers for Gazipur. Hardly the taxi was in motion when our driver lost consciousness, only to discover himself the next day lying in a field and so were the other two passengers, with their money and belongings gone.
The driver didn't know where he was. Although not in his full senses, he decided to walk and soon he found the Airport Road. Half-dazed, he boarded a Gazipur-bound bus. When he did not turn up the next day we thought he could not make it because he overslept as he did not reach home until after two in the morning. The driver had no access to a telephone; so we had no idea as to why he didn't show up the next morning until he briefly reported the matter on a public telephone. He could not report for duty next seven days, such was the impact of the drug that knocked him out.
When the driver finally reported for duty after a week, we learned the entire story. According to him, the so-called passenger sitting next to the baby-taxi driver was perhaps the gang leader. In complicity with the baby-taxi driver, he conducted the entire operation. On the previous day, our driver drew Tk. 5,000 to deposit a Postal Saving certificate instalment and kept the amount with him, little realizing that he would soon be the victim of such an gruesome incident perpetrated by an organised gang.
Ordinarily the effect of an anaesthetic such as chloroform, nitrous oxide or ether wears of within a few hours but such was the toxicity of the narcotic used by the gang that the entire system of the victim was paralysed. This is not an isolated incident; such incidents near the airport of robbing tired unsuspecting passengers have been taking place, as we know, for two decades or more. Still fresh in our mind is the hair-raising incident in which the victim of hijacking was murdered and his dead body was dropped from the vehicle carrying the corpse.
Several years ago one of my colleagues at the department of Botany, Dhaka University, fell into the hands of miscreants. At the crack of the dawn, he arrived at a Dhaka bus terminal and hired a baby-taxi to go to the DU campus. On the way, the baby-taxi stopped at the gas station on the pretext that he needed to fill up his tank. Before he realised what was happening he was attacked by some hooligans. They beat him black and blue and threw dust in his eyes and robbed him of what he had in his possession. It took a long time for my colleague to recover from the injury inflicted on him by these thugs.
What I have reported here is almost a daily event. How is it that such an organised crime goes on right in the heart of the city and in the neighbourhood for such a long time, endangering the lives and property of innocent citizens? Why these gangs which operate with impunity in public places can't be caught and given exemplary punishment to make our movement within the city and neighbourhood safe?
There is obviously a link between certain baby taxi- and cab drivers, and the gangsters, who enjoy beating people and robbing them of what they have. My suggestion is every baby- taxi driver and those who rent these vehicles must not only be registered but there must be background check for each and everyone of them whether they have any criminal records and are connected with any crime syndicate.
RAB has been doing a wonderful job in the cities maintaining law and order by giving exemplary punishment to the lawbreakers. If they also turn their attention to stop the activities of these gangsters, I think soon there will be a substantial decline in the number of such incidents, where innocent citizens fall victim to hardened criminals.
The government has done a number of commendable jobs to curb moral turpitude and weed out corruption. We appeal to them to take this undertaking as a mission before they hand over power to the next elected government.
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