Md Mannan Gazi nowadays visits hospitals whenever he can, offering support to those injured during the July-August mass uprising. The father of two has developed the habit since his only son, Md Shrabon Gazi, was slain during the July-August mass uprising. These visits bring some peace in his unquiet heart.聽
鈥楳y son is gone forever. At least I don鈥檛 have to see him suffer in pain. But those who were injured are enduring endless agony鈥攕ome have lost limbs, and聽 some are left with paralysed body parts,鈥� Mannan, a worker paid on a master roll basis at Savar鈥檚 Central Cattle Breeding and Dairy Farm, said on November 20.
Shrabon Gazi was hit by a bullet in the head in Savar bus stand area about 2:00pm on August 5 as he joined the 鈥楲ong march to Dhaka,鈥� a protest demanding the ouster of the Awami League government, just several hours before Sheikh Hasina resigned as prime minister and fled to India.
Shrabon returned from Malaysia on July 16, the day six people were killed during the protests against quota system in civil service jobs. He took admission in the software engineering department at Tunku Abdul Rahman University of Management and Technology in February this year.
A 2022 Higher Secondary School Certificate graduate from Savar Laboratory College, Shrabon joined the protest with his friends the very next day, on July 17.
On the morning of August 5, Shrabon, who was then 19-year-old, embraced his mother, Shahnaz Begum, from behind and said with a playful smile, 鈥楳a, I am going to war.鈥�
Known for his cheerful and light-hearted nature, Shrabon鈥檚 words didn鈥檛 alarm the mother who thought it was his usual frolic.
He left home around 10:40am. Later that day, Shahnaz spoke to him for the last time over the phone at 1:30pm, asking him to return home for lunch.聽
鈥楬e loved eating hot meals. I prepared lunch and was waiting for him, but he never came back,鈥� said Shahnaz, tears streaming down her face.
About 2:30pm, Shrabon鈥檚 father received a call telling him that his son had been shot.
Later, Gonoshasthaya Samaj Vittik Medical College pronounced Shrabon brought dead at 3:50pm.聽
鈥業, along with my friends, was in the Bus Stand area when the police first started firing tear gas and rubber bullets at us. Around 1:30pm, we saw many people running as the police began firing live bullets, leaving several dead and many injured,鈥� said Shovon, a Jahangirnagar University student who joined the protest that day.
The grieving parents, who live in the residential quarters of the dairy farm, are now left with Shrabon鈥檚 11-year-old only sister Mahima Elahi.聽聽
Shrabon, who loved to sing and dance, was a source of hope not just for his immediate family but for their relatives also.
To prepare him to take on family responsibilities in the future, they collectively raised Tk 7,00,000 to send him abroad for studies, as his father鈥檚 monthly income is only Tk 16,000.
A murder case was filed with the Savar police on August 22, but the family expressed concerns, stating that many innocent people were wrongly named as accused in the case, which they did not want.
Shrabon was buried in the local cemetery in the Dairy Farm area on the same day.
The Directorate General of Health Services, on September 24, said that after a preliminary investigation it had listed 708 people, including Shrabon, having died in the uprising. Its listing is still going on.
Chief adviser Muhammad Yunus on November 17 said that around 1,500 people were killed and 19,931 others injured during the uprising.