Nazeer Ansari (3) and Rohan Reza (6) were vaccinated along with eight other children, who all fell ill after that. 

On Thursday, five of them were admitted with high fever at Gajol Rural Hospital and the rest were released after preliminary treatment. Of them, Nazeer and Rohan were referred to Malda District Hospital and they died while being brought there.

Wahedullah Shah and Abdul Karim, fathers of Nazeeb and Rohan, said the health worker who usually administers the vaccines at the health centre, was absent that day and one Rehana Khatun was in duty in her place. They said the latter might have mishandled the dosage.

As people demonstrated in front of the hospital, the situation was brought under control by police intervention.

Dr Srikanta Roy, CMO of Malda, however, denied any medical negligence. “One child died because of severe pneumonia while the other died because of high fever. Their deaths have nothing to do with the vaccines,” he said. “We have checked the vaccines. They are absolutely fine. If the vaccines were a problem, the other children would have fallen ill too. But they are safe and sound,” he added.