Kushtia Correspondent:

They were on their way home after completing treatment. Little did they know that a one-night stopover in Kolkata would become the final destination of their lives.

Journalist Debashish Dutta, 40, of Kushtia, his wife Afshana Shimmin, 28, their three-year-old son Sharnashish Dutta and his father-in-law Md Akram Ali, 64, were killed in a devastating fire at a residential hotel in Kolkata, India, on Tuesday night.

The deaths of four members of the same family cast a pall of grief over Kushtia on Wednesday.

News of the tragedy reached Kushtia on Wednesday noon, plunging fellow journalists, relatives and local residents into mourning.

Debashish was serving as the Kushtia correspondent of Ajker Patrika and Channel Nine. He was also the acting editor of local daily Ajker Alo. Earlier, he worked as the Kushtia correspondent of several national media outlets, including Asian Television and Nagorik TV.

Gazi Mahbub Rahman, editor of Ajker Alo, confirmed the deaths of Debashish and his three family members.

According to local sources, Debashish travelled to Bengaluru, India, on August 13 with his wife, son and father-in-law for medical treatment. After completing their treatment at Narayana Hospital, they travelled to Kolkata on Tuesday and checked into a residential hotel.

They were scheduled to return to Bangladesh on Wednesday.

However, tragedy struck before they could make the journey home.

A fire broke out at the hotel on Tuesday night and rapidly spread through the building, trapping several guests inside. Debashish and his three family members were among those killed.

The most heartbreaking part of the tragedy is that the couple’s eight-year-old daughter, Pakhi, had remained at their home in Kushtia. She was not in India with her parents, younger brother and maternal grandfather when the fire broke out. Within hours, she lost her father, mother, younger brother and grandfather.

Eight Bangladeshi nationals and one Indian national were among those killed in the fire, according to Indian media reports, including PTI and NDTV.

The deaths of Debashish and his family have cast a deep shadow over the journalism community in Kushtia. Colleagues remembered him as a committed and active journalist, while local journalists, colleagues and people from various walks of life expressed profound grief and conveyed condolences to the bereaved family.