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Sick purposely?

Medical certificates delay verdict in toxic syrup case

Chaitanya Chandra Halder and Emran Hossain
Sick purposely?
Medical certificates delay verdict in toxic syrup case
Chaitanya Chandra Halder and Emran Hossain
The defence appeared to have submitted questionable medical certificates to Dhaka Drug Court yesterday and had the date for delivering judgment on toxic paracetamol syrup case deferred.
Judge Abdur Rashid set July 22 for delivering judgment and ordered defence lawyer Aminur Rahman to ensure presence of two accused that day.
Going through the certificates, this newspaper found that the documents had factual errors. Besides, there were inconsistencies in the statements of the defence lawyer and the physicians.
The physician who issued a medical certificate for accused Helena Pasha, director of Adflame Pharmaceutical, is a friend of the latter.
Neither of the certificates had any medical examination reports attached. Rather, those were just elaboration of ailments signed by physicians.
According to one of the medical certificates, accused Mizanur Rahman, 68, manager of Adflame Pharmaceutical, has been ill since July 9. But Mizan looked quite fit on July 10, the day the court had fixed yesterday for judgment. A correspondent of The Daily Star saw Mizan standing in the dock while 75-year-old Helena was sitting there in a chair.
The correspondent was at the court as he has been following the case in connection with deaths of at least 76 children from adulterated paracetamol syrup.
Attached to the certificates was the lawyer's adjournment plea on health grounds. It mentioned that Mizan was suffering from diarrhoea, whereas the medical certificate said, “...severe cut injury over Lt [left] hand two finger (involve) with since 9/7/14 (sic).”
It was signed on Wednesday by Dr Shamim Haider, a private practitioner at a Rampura medicine store, G-Pharma. The physician also sees patients at the Dhanmondi branch of IBN Sina Hospital from 8:00am to 4:00pm three days a week.
Shamim did not respond to phone calls by this newspaper.
Dated July 13, the medical certificate for accused Adflame Director Helena Pasha came from Dr Chowdhury Habibur Rahman, a retired physician practising privately in a chamber on his Banani apartment flat's ground floor.
Contacted, Habib said he knew Helena when they were students at Sir Salimullah Medical College. Helena had visited him for the certificate around a week ago. If it was exactly seven days ago counting from yesterday, the friends might have met on Friday, the only day
when Habib does not work.
Habib ceased talking to this newspaper immediately after he came to know that the reporter was verifying the certificate issued by him.
"When someone in her mid-70's comes limping and feels pain in every movement of her hands, she can surely be given a medical certificate for illness," insisted the physician.
Asked about the dubious certificates, Ekramuddin Shyamol, one of the two defence lawyers present at the court, passed the blame on his senior lawyer, saying that he was responsible only for submitting the adjournment plea.
However, his senior lawyer Aminur Rahman's cell phone was found switched off.
Two of the five accused in the Adflame case have been absconding ever since they were granted bail after filing ofthecasein 1993.
In 1992, the company's paracetamol brand Flammadol was tested to have contained diethylene glycol along with other paracetamol syrup brands manufactured by four more pharmaceuticals. The other accused has passed away.
A pharmaceutical was spared prosecution apparently for its owners' good ties with the then BNP govern-ment. Of the other four pharmaceuticals, Rex Pharma was acquitted by a Mymensingh court in 2003 allegedly for deliberate destruction of evidence by complainant, the Directorate of Drug Administration.
The proceedings in two other cases against as many drug producers have been stayed since 1994 by a High Court order.
The trial of Adflame was also stayed in the same year by another HC order. It resumed in November 2009 after a Daily Star investigation revealed that the stay order in this case had been vacated two years ago, which remained unknown to the trial court.