Charges framed against BLAST employee

A Cox's Bazar court yesterday framed charges against an employee of Bangladesh Legal Aid and Services Trust (BLAST) in a defamation case of Tk 100 crore filed by Border Guard Bangladesh (BGB) last year.

The court of Senior Judicial Magistrate Tamanna Farah in Cox's Bazar passed the order in presence of the accused, said BGB's lawyer Md Sazzadul Karim.

Abdul Sukkur, a lawyer for the BLAST employee, said, "We have submitted a petition to the court for my client's acquittal, but it was rejected."

Asked, Borkot Ali, a lawyer of BLAST, also said they had filed an application under Section 241(A) to discharge the employee  from the charges, but the application was rejected. He did not want to make any further comment on this issue.

Protiva Das, a conducting lawyer; BLAST president at Cox's Bazar Abul Kalam Siddique and ex-president advocate AJM Moinuddin took part in the hearing.

On March 11, the court granted bail to the accused and set yesterday to frame charges against her.

BGB, on November 10 last year, filed a defamation case for "premeditated propagation of false allegations such as that of gang-raping" against some of its personnel.

The BLAST employee is the lone accused in the case.

Complainant Nayeb Subedar Mohammad Ali Molla, in-charge of Damdamia checkpost of BGB Battalion-2 on Cox's Bazar-Teknaf highway, in the case statement, said the woman's "false allegation" has severely tarnished the BGB's image as a force.

In a press statement released on October 13, 2020, BLAST demanded justice for its employee, saying that she was a victim of sexual violence at a checkpoint on the Teknaf-Cox's Bazar road. It also demanded that the government ensure her safety.