Pro-BNP ward commissioner dies in custody

Relatives mourn the death of Dhaka City Corporation ward commissioner Abdul Qayum Khan at Dhaka Medical College Hospital yesterday.Photo: STAR

Detained ward commissioner and BNP leader Abdul Qayum Khan died at Dhaka Medical College Hospital (DMCH) yesterday morning.
The dead body of Qayum was handed over to his relatives at 4:00pm after autopsy.
Qayum, who was cultural secretary of Dhaka municipal BNP, was detained from his South Kafrul residence on January 12 last year, the day after the state of emergency was declared. He was kept in cell-7 of Dhaka Central Jail.
Family members meanwhile claimed that Qayum, 45, died because of lack of treatment for heart diseases he had been suffering from for the last four years. They demanded probe into the matter.
Jail authorities, however, claimed that Qayum received treatment under supervision of jail doctors.
Abdul Baten, brother-in-law of Qayum, told The Daily Star that the ward commissioner was detained although there was neither any case nor even a general diary (GD) filed against him. Qayum was popular in his ward-16, he added.
Qayum obtained bail from the High Court on January 10 this year but the police arrested him again at the jail gate as soon as he came out and was taken into a month's detention on January 24.
Relatives claimed that Qayum became frustrated soon after the arrest and became ill, which ultimately led to his death.
DIG (Prisons) Major Shamsul Haider Siddiqui told The Daily Star yesterday evening that Qayum fell unconscious on the toilet floor at 7:45am.
The doctors at DMCH declared Qayum dead after the jail authorities took him there at 9:20am.
DCC Mayor Sadeque Hossain Khoka rushed to the DMCH emergency department at 11:45am to see Qayum's dead body.
Khoka told newsmen there that there was no case against Qayum. "I wonder why he was detained," he said, demanding probe into the allegation that the ward commissioner died due to lack of treatment.
Meanwhile, expressing deep concern over the incident, leaders of both the BNP factions also alleged that the detained ward commissioner did not receive proper treatment in jail.
"Qayum died due to lack of treatment in jail," Khandaker Delwar Hossain, Khaleda Zia-appointed secretary general of BNP, said in a press release yesterday. "The government should investigate the matter," he said.