A couple's dream lost forever

A picture of Rumki Akhter and her husband Maksudur Rahman, both of whom died in Thursday's fire at FR Tower. The photo was taken from Maksudur's Facebook page.

Rumki Akhter and Maksudur Rahman had fallen in love while working at a travel agency. Eventually, they got married three years ago and dreamt of owning a flat. With their savings, they bought a flat in the city's Gendaria, which was almost ready. They were scheduled to shift there within next two months.

But their dream is not fulfilled as the couple along with 23 others lost their lives in a fire at the 22-storey FR Tower in Banani on Thursday.

Relatives struggled to find them around the building after the fire broke out around 12:30pm. They could just say Rumki and Maksud got trapped in the office room of Heritage Air Express, a travel agency, on the 10th floor of the building, as they spoke to the two by phones shortly after the fire broke out. 

The relatives were talking to The Daily Star at Dhaka Medical College Hospital on Thursday night.

Talking to this newspaper yesterday, Imtiaz Ahmed, cousin of Maksud, 32, said he identified Maksud's body at United Hospital in the afternoon. He came to learn from doctors that Maksud died after falling from the 10th floor.

Imtiaz said they identified Rumki, who died of suffocation, at the burn unit of DMCH around 8:00pm.

“They had a dream for a flat. All the dreams of the couple have gone now,” he told The Daily Star.

Dilara Hossain, sister-in-law of Maksud, a resident of Gendaria, said he had been working as an executive at Heritage Air Express since 2010 after completing his graduation from a private university in Dhaka.

Rumki, 30, daughter of Sayed Ashraf Ali of Nilphamari's Jaldhaka, did her honours in Islamic History from Carmichael College in Rangpur and was admitted to Government Titumir College in Dhaka in 2014 for doing her master's, said Mukta Begum, cousin of Rumki.

Rumki, who was also an executive at the same travel agency, started the job when she was a student.

Mukta said the happily married couple visited Nilphamari only a week ago.

Ashraf Ali said his wife died only four months ago and Rumki had been his great source of mental support since then. “How shall I now endure the pain of my daughter's death?”