Masked men kill trader brutally

Masked assailants killed a man by hitting on his head with a heavy object at his house in the capital's Mirpur on Sunday night.

The dead is Gias Uddin, 35, a garment accessory trader who lived on the fourth floor of his six-storey building at block-C in Mirpur-10.

The body was sent to Dhaka Medical College morgue for an autopsy. Morgue sources said there were scratches on the body and his head was crushed.

Although Gias's wife Lovely Yeasmin Lina claimed two to three masked criminals killed her husband, her in-laws blamed her for the murder. The couple had a daughter and a son.

Police yesterday picked up Lina for interrogation. Inspector (investigation) of Mirpur Police Station Moinul Islam said they got two different versions of the incident.

On Sunday, Gias returned home around 10:00pm and told his wife that guests were coming. Minutes later, two to three men entered the flat. They tied her up with a piece of cloth, gagged her mouth and sent her to another room. They also sent the children to the balcony. Then they asked Gias for money and started torturing, leaving him critically injured, said the inspector, quoting Lina.

However, Gias's sister Rashida Begum told The Daily Star that the couple had been having marital problems since long and quarrelled over different issues regularly. She also alleged that Lina had extra-marital affairs.

"She [Lina] might have hired outsiders for the murder and now staging a drama over the issue by saying criminals had killed him," claimed Rashida.

The inspector said they were investigating if the killing had taken place over family feud, business row or for any other reason.

Bilkis Begum Nargis, a next-door resident, said they did not hear anything as the volume on the television set of the deceased house was turned up.

She added that around 10:45pm, Gias's 11-year-old daughter Ishika knocked the door of their flat. On hearing the incident from Ishika, they rushed to their flat and found the body of Gias lying on the floor in a pool of blood. They also found Lina tied up.

Joynal Abedin, a shopkeeper on the ground floor of the building, said Gias came to his shop around 10:00pm for a container. Gias left his shop saying "Guests are coming, I am going [to my flat]" after receiving a phone call.

"After 20 minutes of his departure, I saw a person veiled in a burqa but wearing shoes coming out of the building. Ten minutes later, I heard scream."