Sedition case against Jamaat leaders dismissed
A Dhaka court yesterday dismissed the sedition case against Jamaat leaders Ali Ahsan Mohammad Mojahid and Abdul Quader Molla and former Islami Bank chairman Shah Md Abdul Hannan as the police did not take government approval for recording the case.
However, police passed the blame on the complainant saying that he should have taken government approval before filing the case.
The legal experts said it is the duty of police not the complainant to take government approval before moving the sedition case.
The court in its order said the case was dismissed as police did not take approval from the government for recording the case.
When contacted, Md Lutfor Rahman, officer-in-charge (OC) of Tejgaon Police Station, told The Daily Star, "The complainant should have obtained government approval before filing the case. As a policeman I know that this type of case requires government approval before it is filed. For this reason I did not take the complaint as a case.”
“I also sought instructions from the CMM court in this regard but it did not give any directive,” he added.
In an instant reaction last evening, Advocate Shahdeen Malik told The Daily Star that the police deliberately proceeded in such a way that the court had no option but to dismiss the case.
“But the police must answer why they did not take approval from the government,” he said adding that it is certainly the responsibility of the police as a complainant is unable to get government approval.
“I would expect an investigation by the police department itself as to why the law enforcers did not take government approval in this regard,” Shahdeen Malik said.
After the case was filed against the three, Law and Information Adviser Barrister Mainul Hosein said an individual cannot file a sedition case.
Mohammad Fazlur Rahman, a freedom fighter of Keraniganj, filed the sedition case against Jamaat-e-Islami Secretary General Ali Ahsan Mohammad Mojahid, its Assistant Secretary General Abdul Quader Molla and Jamaat sympathiser and former chairman of Islami Bank Shah Md Abdul Hannan on December 5 last year for their involvement in anti-liberation activities.
In the order, Metropolitan Magistrate Mohammad Emran Hossain Chowdhury mentioned that the OC of Tejgaon Police Station had a chance to get the government approval but he did not do so.
The court ordered the OC to register the case against the three as a regular one and submit a report after conducting an investigation.
The case statement said the accused were involved in anti-Liberation War activities and committed massacres by forming Al Badr, Al Shams and Razakar forces in 1971. They recently made derogatory remarks on the Liberation War by terming it a civil war and denied the existence of anti-liberation forces.
Jamaat leader Mojahid, also former social welfare minister, on October 25 denied his party's involvement in anti-liberation activities claiming that the anti-liberation forces never existed in the country.
The next day, Hannan, former chairman of the National Board Revenue, termed the Liberation War a 'civil war' in a talk show on a private TV channel.
Quader Molla at a discussion on October 31 said the freedom fighters joined the Liberation War being lured by beautiful Indian women, and for grabbing property of the Hindus in the country.
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