Eleven years is fairly a long time, but not so in this case. Survivors of the 2007 twin bomb blasts at Lumbini Park and Gokul Chat Bhandar here – that left 44 dead and over 60 injured – and families of the dead are still struggling to come to terms with it. What’s worse is that their condition is even more pathetic now. Normalcy eludes them, as does any sense of justice.
Senior design engineer G. Sadashiv Reddy was 25 when he was injured in the blasts at Gokul Chat, a popular eatery at the busy Koti area. Till date, his mother, G. Vasanta, has to take care of him. Now 36, he is as dependent on his mother or other family members as an infant, with hardly any signs of improvement.
Seriously injured
Mr. Reddy, who worked for a private electrical company at Somajiguda, was sent to Japan twice by his employers on work and his life was good until the bomb blast on the rainy evening of August 25, 2007.
“He was seriously injured and was saved by the doctors from the jaws of death,” said his mother Ms. Vasanta, crying inconsolably.
“He lost his vision in one eye and also his voice and teeth, while his right hand and leg are paralysed,” she said, adding that for the last few months, he is trying to walk with the help of a walker at his residence at Brundavan Colony of Saroornagar. Three pellets are still stuck in his hand, liver and neck and Mr. Reddy also suffered partial damage to his skull.
“As a mother who is serving her 36-year-old son for the past 11 years, I’m not at all bothered about the verdict. If anyone wants to help me, please bring my son back to normalcy,” said Ms. Vasanta.
Recalling the fateful evening, Syed Raheem, 67, a painter from Saidabad who lost his left eye in Gokul Chat bomb blast, demanded strict punishment for the accused. “I lost my livelihood and many have lost their kin in the twin blasts,” he said.
Mr. Raheem said he has spent about ₹10 lakh on his treatment. He was just a few metres away from the chat bhandar buying ice cream for his younger daughter when the improvised explosives devices (IEDs), allegedly planted by the Indian Mujahideen, went off, minutes after the explosion at Lumbini Park opposite the Secretariat.
Meanwhile, Ayesha Sultana, 65, who lost her brother, sister-in-law and their two young children in the blast said 11 years after the incident, she is still unable to come out of the trauma.
“My brother Md. Saleem, along with his wife Syeda Fareeda Naaz and their children Md. Aamer, 8, and Md. Ali, 5, left home for Gokul Chat on his scooter and returned in an ambulance. Fareeda was pregnant and minutes before the blast, I spoke to her over the phone as the flat keys were with them. She asked me to stay at our relative’s house at Lakdi-ka-pul and would return home shortly,” she recalled.
Unpaid compensation
Ms. Sultana maintained that she is still waiting for the compensation announced by the then Congress government and no one has come forward to help her too.