C T Online Desk: Family, friends and well-wishers remembered veteran freedom fighter and Gonoshasthaya Kendra founder Zafrullah Chowdhury.
The family of the Independence Award recipient organised a prayer session to pray for his departed soul at Zafrullah’s house in Dhanmondi on Friday.
Shireen Huq, wife of Zafrullah and a member of Naripokkho, said that Zafrullah had only one thing in his mind all the time and that was ensuring the well-being of the country.
‘Save the Country’ was Zafrullah’s last wish, said Shireen while reminiscing the last few days of his life.
Binayak Sen, director general of the Bangladesh Institute of Development Studies, said that Zafrullah’s contribution to formulating the National Drug Policy in 1982 paved the way for domestic companies to manufacture drugs and eventually shaped the country’s pharmaceutical sector.
Terming Zafrullah as a diversified personality, he urged all to contribute to completing his unfinished works, including building a cancer hospital, to serve the poor people.
Kashem Chowdhury, a trustee of the Gonoshasthaya Kendra, said that Zafrullah always supported and actively participated in movements held for rights causes.
‘He used to say that he did politics for general people,’ Kashem added.
Emeritus professor Serajul Islam Choudhury, Nobel laureate professor Muhammad Yunus, Gonoforum president and eminent jurist Dr Kamal Hossain, New Age publisher ASM Shahidullah Khan, professor Naila Z Khan and former Bangladesh Bank governor Salehuddin Ahmed, among others, participated in the event.
Zafrullah breathed his last on April 11 at the age of 82.
He founded Gonoshasthaya Kendra in 1972 to provide healthcare services to underprivileged communities in Bangladesh.
The healthcare centre is now providing healthcare services at an affordable cost across the country through seven hospitals and 50 sub-centres.
For his outstanding contribution to ensuring healthcare for the poor, Zafrullah earned the title ‘Poor People’s Doctor.’
