Toxic Paracetamol: Rid Pharma MD, wife get bail

Managing Director of Rid Pharmaceuticals Ltd Mizanur Rahman and his wife Sheuli Rahman yesterday obtained bail after they surrendered before a Dhaka court seeking bail in the case filed over the deaths of 28 children in 2009.

Judge M Atoar Rahman of the Drug Court passed the order after they appeared before it as per the High Court order.

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Earlier on March 9, the HC directed five officials of Rid Pharmaceuticals Ltd, who were acquitted in a case filed for manufacturing toxic paracetamol syrup, to surrender before the trial court within seven days.

Three other fugitive accused are Rid Pharma's director Abdul Gani, and pharmacists Mahbubul Islam and Enamul Haque.

The government in January filed an appeal with the HC, challenging the lower court verdict.

From June to August in 2009, 28 children across the country died of renal failures caused by the intake of the paracetamol syrup and suspension allegedly manufactured by Rid Pharma.

On July 22, 2009, the Directorate General of Drug Administration (DGDA) sealed off Rid's factory in BSCIC area of Brahmanbaria following wide media coverage of the children's death, and findings of Dhaka Shishu (Children) Hospital physician Prof Mohammad Hanif that Rid Pharma's Temset had toxic substance.

In August that year, Shafiqul Islam, then superintendent of the Drug Administration, filed the case with the Drug Court and only five prosecution witnesses testified after the court indicted the five accused in March 2011.

On November 28 last year, the Drug Court acquitted all the five, saying the prosecution utterly failed to prove the charge against them.

Negligence, inefficiency and incompetence of the Drug Administration in dealing with the case led to their acquittal, the judge said in the verdict.

Two officials of Drug Administration involved in the case against Rid Pharmaceuticals violated due legal procedure, and showed sheer negligence and incompetence in dealing the case, the verdict said.

The two officials are Shafiqul Islam and Altaf Hossain. Both of them were drug superintendents in 2009. Shafiqul is now an assistant director of the Directorate General of Drug Administration while Altaf is a deputy director, said a DGDA director in December last year.