Fire to Santal Homes: Probe identifies 2 cops
A police sub-inspector and a constable who set fire to Santal homes in Gaibandha in November have finally been identified.
They are SI Mahbubur Rahman of Detective Branch and Constable Sajjad Hossain of Gaibandha Police Lines.
The two have already been suspended and departmental proceedings against them are underway, the police said in two reports submitted before the High Court yesterday.
Several other people were also involved in the November 6 arson attack, but they could not be identified yet. They too will face legal action if they can be identified in future, the reports said.
Deputy Inspector General of police of Rangpur Range Khandker Golam Faruk and a three-member probe committee led by Additional DIG Chowdhury Manjrul Karim submitted the reports through Deputy Attorney General Motaher Hossain Sazu to the HC bench of Justice Obaidul Hassan and Justice Krishna Debnath.
Doha-based TV Al Jazeera was first to air a video, apparently shot on mobile phone, showing police members' involvement. The footage, broadcast on December 11, shows a man in a pink T-shirt trying to set a Santal shanty on fire in front of some armed policemen.
Later, a policeman in uniform and another man in a half-sleeve shirt and black pants join the first man. Soon, the shanty catches fire.
The video went viral and local media ran reports based on the footage.
Contacted, DAG Motaher Hossain said the HC did not pass any order since it was satisfied with the government action so far against those involved, including the two cops.
However, the court will give its verdict on a writ petition filed by Ain o Salish Kendra, Brotee and the Association for Land Reform and Development, seeking orders from the court over the incident, he added.
SI Mahbubur was suspended on February 23 and subsequently transferred to Dinajpur Police Lines, police sources said.
Contacted yesterday, Mahbubur protested his innocence and claimed he was a victim of a conspiracy. “Top police officials of Rangpur Range were present there.”
On November 6 last year, at least two Santal people were killed and more than 20 others injured in a clash between indigenous people and labourers as well as police at Shahebganj sugarcane farm of Rangpur Sugar Mills in Gobindaganj upazila over a land dispute.
The Daily Star has learnt from old documents that Santals owned most of the land before the government acquired it in the 1950s.
Though the land was acquired for sugarcane farming to produce raw materials for the sugar mill in Gobindaganj, parts of the land were leased out for cultivating other crops, flouting an agreement of 1962.
Meanwhile, community leaders in Joypur and Madarpur villages in Gobindaganj reacted sharply to the police reports.
“Why only two policemen? There were more,” Philimon Baske, a community leader, told our Dinajpur correspondent.
“And who directed the two policemen to set fire to Santal houses?” he asked.
He claimed local politicians and policemen of different ranks were involved in the arson attack intended to evict the Santal people.
Nearly 400 policemen were deployed that day. Wearing helmets, some of them started setting fire to Santal houses. Later, some locals and employees of the sugar mill joined them, alleged Rafayel Hasda, another community leader.
Earlier, Gaibandha Chief Judicial Magistrate Mohammad Shahidullah in his report said two policemen, one detective and some locals were directly involved in the arson attack.
The magistrate said he could not identify them because the district police administration did not cooperate.
He had sought the names and designations of the three cops in question to the Gaibandha SP, but he did not provide those.
The SP, Ashraful Islam, was later transferred to Khagrachhari, following an HC order.
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