Govt makes U-turn
The state minister for law said it was a mistake to recommend the withdrawal of the robbery and murder charges against five persons and the government has taken steps to ensure that they are tried.
The home ministry on August 26 recommended withdrawal of the charges against Joynal Abedin Mollah, Ikbal Hossain, Shahin, Sharif and Humayun Kabir Reaz in a case considering them ''politically motivated” and meant for “harassment”. Of them, Shahin and Humayun are on the run.
The home ministry made a U-turn at its meeting yesterday, a day after charges against the five were dropped.
A letter signed by M Abu Sayed Mollah, assistant secretary to the ministry, was sent to the public prosecutor office in the afternoon to include the five as accused in the case.
The case has 10 accused.
After receiving the letter, Metropolitan Public Prosecutor Abdullah Abu submitted a petition along with the letter to the Speedy Trial Tribunal-2, Dhaka. The hearing on including the five back into the case will be held on January 3.
According to the case filed with Uttara Police Station, Abdul Hamid, an engineer and a resident of Dakkhin Khan in the capital, was shot dead by the accused on January 29, 2005.
The gang also shot his daughter Farah Hamid, 14, and looted about Tk 25,000, around 15 tolas of gold ornaments and other valuables from the house.
Victim's wife Syeda Hamid filed a case accusing five people, including gang leader Joynul Abedin Mollah, the same day. Five others--Ashraf alias Dipu, Mohammad Firoz Miah, Niranjan Chandra Pal, Nawsher Rahman and Zakir Hossain--were included in the charge sheet by the investigation officer of the case.
State Minister for Law Qamrul Islam termed the withdrawal recommendation of the case an unintentional mistake.
“There may be one or two mistakes since we are dealing with thousands of cases,” he told The Daily Star, claiming that the committee itself changed its decisions in about 50 cases after finding that the decisions it made were wrong.
He said that the committee changed its previous decisions whenever it found any such mistakes.
“I thank the journalist community for finding out the mistakes, thus helping us amend the mistake,” he added.
The decision to recommend the withdrawal came less than a month after the home ministry revived the businessman Afatabuddin murder case that cleared 19 accused of murder charges, including two top-listed gangsters.
The Awami League after assuming office in January 2009 moved to withdraw cases, which were filed during the rule of BNP-led four-party alliance and the last caretaker governments, allegedly just to harass people.
Comments