Bailey Road fire: Confusion over identity delays handover of journalist Abhishruti's body
Abhishruti worked as a reporter for the online news portal The Report.
![Journalist Abhishruti Shashtri. Photo: Collected from Facebook](https://www.tbsnews.net/sites/default/files/styles/big_2/public/images/2024/03/01/abhishruti.png)
Confusion over the identity of Journalist Abhishruti Shastri, who was killed in the fire at a commercial building at Bailey Road in the capital, has delayed the process of handing over her body to her family.
Abhishruti worked as a reporter for the online news portal The Report.
According to her father Shahburul Alam Sabuj, her daughter's name is Bristi Khatun and she is a Muslim but her friends and colleagues claimed that she was known as Abhishruti and that she claimed to be a Hindu.
The different claims led to confusion when Sabuj came to get her daughter's body from the Sheikh Hasina Burn Institute at around 3:00pm Friday (1 March).
Later, the hospital authorities checked her voter identity card and used her fingerprint to confirm the data in the government database, where they found her identity is registered as Bristi Khatun.
Convinced of her identity, hospital authorities later began the body handover process.
![Abhishruti's father Shahburul Alam Sabuj speaks to reporters at the Sheikh Hasina Burn Institute on 1 March 2024. Photo: Collected](https://www.tbsnews.net/sites/default/files/styles/infograph/public/images/2024/03/01/420626466_393683283269820_6768260189942288807_n.jpg)
Speaking to reporters in front of the hospital, Sabuj said, "I wanted to raise my girl to be a prominent figure in the future. My daughter always told me 'Baba, don't worry. I will be a good human being'.
"My daughter never wanted to take money from me. She used to say, 'I can take care of myself. You don't need to worry, Baba'. I had so many hopes and dreams, all of those ended.
"I used to say that village girls can't do anything better. But I will go to the village and say that my daughter does a lot of things. What will I take to the village now?"
Sabuj said he would head for his village in Kushtia's Khoksa upazila tonight with her daughter's body.
A total of 46 people have died so far in the fire in a commercial building at Bailey Road.