Bangladesh News

Another body of an army officer killed during the mutiny at the Bangladesh Rifles (BDR) headquarters at Pilkhana floated out of a sluice gate in the city’s Nawabganj yesterday, raising the death toll to 74.

The dead was identified as Lt Col Golam Kibria, a Senior Record officer at the BDR headquarters.

Locals noticed the body floating in front of the sluice gate at around 8:30am.

On information, army personnel rushed to the spot and recovered the body.

The deceased’s wife Sharmin Kibria identified her husband’s body at Sir Salimullah Medical College morgue by marks on the back of his right hand and on the left wrist.

Sharmin said she talked to her husband the last time over mobile phone at around 10:30am on Wednesday.

She said her husband was posted to the BDR headquarters only eight days before the mutiny took place.

Relatives of the missing army officers including Col Gulzar thronged the BDR headquarters and morgues of the Dhaka and Sir Salimuallah Medical Colleges in search of their loved ones.

Earlier, eight bodies of BDR officers –two on Wednesday and six on Thursday — killed during the mutiny floated out of the same sluice gate.

Meanwhile, members of the army, navy and fire service continued search at the BDR headquarters yesterday.

Deputy Director of Fire Service and Civil Defence Sheikh Mizanur Rahman said they pumped water from the ponds to the manholes at the BDR headquarters so that bodies, if trapped in the sewer, are flushed out of the sluice gate.

The unidentified bodies of five army officers were kept at Dhaka Medical College Morgue while two more unidentified bodies — one of a girl and the other of a boy — have been lying at Salimullah Medical College morgue for the last three days.