Zakeria Shirazi

FOR a long time it has been evident that something is seriously wrong with our river transportation service with regard to passenger safety but little was done to change the situation and accidents kept occurring one after another. Last Thursday’s tragedy on the river Buriganga is the latest reminder that the errors and nonchalance continue. What happened on that fateful afternoon is particularly unfortunate. In this case it was not perhaps in the power of the sunken launch ML Sourav-1 to do much to avert the accident, since it was caused when a sand-laden cargo boat Ibrahim Lodi hit her from behind. Agreeing that primary responsibility for causing the accident lay with the latter vessel, questions still remain. If all the safety provisions of a passenger craft were fulfilled, she would be better able to withstand a jolt. But she had already compromised her safety. It has been revealed that ML Sourav-1 was overloaded, carrying passengers far in excess of her capacity of 67. Her master was not certified. A trained master might have been able to manoeuvre the listing craft to safety.

Moreover, launches usually do not keep handy the life vests and if a few there exist, these are more for demonstrative purpose than for any practical use. Not only is the master uncertified, the crew-members never know what to do in the case of an emergency and we have not heard of any launch ever carrying out a simulation drill as part of accident preparedness of the crew. Training of the master is given by the government but recruitment is the jurisdiction of the employer, that is the launch owner, who is under no obligation to employ only a properly trained candidate and for financial reasons prefers to recruit whomsoever it can on the cheap. On this too the government seems to exercise no control and once a former minister deplored the situation.

When all the safety rules have been cynically dispensed with, an accident is in fact invited and any minor factor may bring it on. But by saying so we certainly do not make light of the crime of the crew of the MV Ibrahim Lodi for carelessly cruising and hitting the passenger vessel in broad daylight and causing scores of deaths. Its crime is of felonious proportions. A five-member probe committee has been set up. Such probe committees had been formed after many previous incidents of launch capsize but their impact was not much visible insofar as minimisation of accidents was concerned. Nothing changes in the country’s river transportation system, all the hazards remain in place, none is punished, none is called to account, the launch owners have their own way. According to one estimate, more than three thousand people were killed in 408 river accidents since independence. The vessels which have never been recovered number 90 or more. Not only are the country’s two rescue vessels old but the launches they are required to rescue are sometimes too heavy for them.

Accidents do happen but how the government and those responsible for safety of lives respond to a tragedy is the real test. To inefficiency is added insensitivity. Accidents cannot be completely eliminated but safety measures can certainly be improved and accountability established. The precipitating causes that have been listed are error in designing of vessels, defective and old vessels which are no longer river worthy, unqualified operators, overloading, disregard of weather conditions and overall carelessness like plying at night without keeping the searchlight on. Overload also results from carrying excessive volumes of cargo. The old rule that cargo should be carried separately by cargo ships has fallen into disuse, like many other safety rules.

River transport sector is a weak and neglected sector and is bristled with corruption due to which half of the 20,000 river craft have no registration. Of these 20,000 river craft 8,000 carry passengers but only 2,000 are registered. These disturbing statistics were published in the media a little more than two years ago. And registration is no guarantee of safety, since it can be purchased. In May 2005 a major river accident had taken place in Patuakhali when the ML Prince sank resulting in death of about one hundred passengers. The launch had been registered under a different name in 1982 with the stated capacity for 66 persons. After that the launch, according to a newspaper report, had sunk twice but that did not prevent her from getting registration under a new name, the ML Prince of Patuakhali.

Not only are most vessels without registration, defect in designing is said to be responsible for 70 per cent accidents. As rivers are losing navigability vessels have to be made with low draught though bigger in size, which, it is alleged, leads to some kind of imbalance in the structure.

River transport is the lifeline of this country with its 5,000 miles of river routes on which 6 crore people travel or used to travel annually. We had to add a qualification to the figure considering that a recent report showed that due to frequency of accidents, passenger traffic by river is lessening and that the daily two-way flow of passengers from the Sadarghat river terminal has declined from 20,000 to 10,000. (Even then the launches are often overloaded, a significant aspect of the country’s demography). Let us consider the implication.

People need to travel. The only alternatives left to passengers are buses and coaches, since there has been no expansion of the railways nor is any significant future expansion envisaged. (It is strange that there is no public demand for development of the railways. Public demand is always there for new road bridge, new road, bus service. But unlike in other countries, the people here feel no romantic attachment for the railways. The railway is everywhere regarded as a relatively safer transport but in this country even that is doubtful.) This increasing dependence on road transport with its limited infrastructure is not desirable. People travelling on rooftops of buses even on long routes are a common sight. River transport is economic and less polluting.

What about compensation to victims or their families? In the case of last Thursday’s accident the government has announced a compensation of Taka 20,000 for each case of death. That is a pittance that almost borders on mockery. But it is understandable that if the fund comes from taxpayers’ money, there is an obvious limitation. Why the taxpayers must pay for the crime or callousness of launch owners? How is it that after every accident and the following enquiry committee and its report the launch owners go scot-free?

Mandatory insurance of the lives of passengers is nowhere in sight. If insurance were made compulsory the insurance companies themselves would make sure that the launch owners conform to the safety rules and the government would be spared the duty of supervising. If the government wants to punish the owners and to do justice to the launch passengers who are usually poor villagers, there are other ways to do so. For example, the automatic asset of the owners, namely the launch, after her rescue may be auctioned off to create a fund for compensation. In dealing with launch owners successive governments have shown a strange kind of pusillanimity.

Two years ago the owners raised launch fare by 30 per cent. The government had to approve, and that too without enforcing adherence to safety rules. The launch owners not only defy the government and get away with it, they even browbeat the government. In August 2002 public outcry after a series of launch accidents forced the government to show some activity. When it took steps to tighten safety rules, the owners had the temerity to threaten a strike. The government had to give in. Such is the power of the launch owners. But perhaps it is not only that owners are powerful, but the launch passengers, the nameless, faceless and poor ones, are powerless.