A 19-year-old young man was killed on Wednesday evening after a cocktail bomb exploded on a busy footpath in New Eskaton, Dhaka, raising renewed concerns about public safety in densely populated urban areas. The incident occurred around 7:45 pm in front of the Bangladesh Muktijoddha Central Command Council, near the Moghbazar intersection.
Eyewitnesses said the victim, later identified as Siam Majumder, had just approached a tea stall to ask for tea when a sudden explosion occurred. A tea vendor told reporters that he heard a loud blast and saw Siam lying on the ground with severe head injuries, bleeding heavily. The area, lined with multiple tea stalls, is usually crowded throughout the day due to nearby schools and evening gatherings of people from the theatre and film community.
Police officials confirmed that the explosive device was a powerful cocktail bomb believed to have been thrown from the flyover above the road. According to Masud Alam, Deputy Commissioner of Ramna Division Police, the bomb fell directly onto the victim, causing critical injuries that led to his death at the scene shortly afterward.
Siam worked at a motor parts shop across the road and lived with his family in Eskaton’s Two Thousand Alley. His father, Ali Akbar Majumder, a rickshaw puller, was seen crying at the scene late Wednesday night. The family’s ancestral home is in Dighalia, Khulna.
According to his father, Siam had left home at around 9:00 am for work and had gone out to deliver cups from the motor parts shop to a nearby tea stall when the bomb exploded. The killing of a young worker in such a public space has once again highlighted the deadly consequences of unchecked violence and explosives in everyday civilian areas of Dhaka
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