Please help, you're our only hope

“My husband had traced many victims while serving as Rab commanding officer, but no one came forward to help us find him when he went missing in August. Four months have gone by; we are yet to find his whereabouts.”

“We are helpless. Honourable prime minister, you're our only hope, last resort. Please direct law enforcers to find my husband…,” Shamima Akhtar broke down in tears.

Wife of Hasinur Rahman, a former commanding officer of Rapid Action Battalion-7, was speaking at a press conference in Dhaka yesterday. “None other than law enforcers could have picked him up from a secured place like Mirpur DOHS,” she said. She urged for Hasinur's safe return before the national election.

Hasinur, who was also an army lieutenant colonel (sacked), was allegedly picked up by 14 to 15 plainclothes men around 10:30pm on August 8 when he was on his way home after meeting his friends, Shamima said.

Her husband cried for help when plainclothes men tried to force him into a microbus, she said quoting locals. As locals approached to help him, the men, wearing jackets with “DB” inscribed on them, told them they were from the Detective Branch of police.

They came in two microbuses, Shamima said. They also picked up caretaker of the house as he tried to capture photos but later dropped him near ECB intersection, she added.

Both Rab and Police, however, had denied picking up Hasinur. Shamima filed a general diary with Pallabi Police Station on August 9. 

Hasinur also worked with the Border Guard Bangladesh. He was sacked from the army for alleged connections to militants. Shamima, however, claimed that her husband was an honest and patriotic officer who became a victim of conspiracy.

“While serving as a Rab official, he [Hasinur] had arrested a good number of militants. You will find it in reports published in newspapers,” she said.

Shamima, on August 17, over a week after her husband had gone missing, made a similar appeal to the PM.

At yesterday's press conference, Dr SM Ehteshamul Haque, brother-in-law of Hasinur, said, “If Hasinur had committed any crime, he should be produced before a court.”

Contacted, Sub-inspector Monirul Islam of Pallabi Police Station, who is investigating the GD, said they are trying to find Hasinur.