DHAKA, April 13, 2019 (BSS) – Hearing on death reference and jail appeals filed by the convicts in the murder case lodged over bomb blasts in Ramna Batamul in 2001, is scheduled to be held soon as the matter came on the High Court cause list.
The matter is now kept at the cause list of a High Court division bench comprising Justice Md. Ruhul Quddus and Justice ASM Abdul Mobin for hearing.
“After the pronouncement of lower court judgement in the case in 2014, the matter came to the High Court as death reference. Jail appeals have also been filed by this time. The case came on the 24th number on the case list on April 11. Now we are waiting for the case to be heard shortly,” deputy attorney general Md Moniruzzaman told BSS.
Attorney General Mahbubey Alam too said initiatives have been taken to hold the hearing on the matter soon.
“The prosecution is very much alert in this regard for the sake of justice over that grisly attack,” the chief state counsel said.
Additional metropolitan sessions’ judge court on June 23, 2014, sentenced eight people to death and six others to life imprisonment in the murder case lodged over the incident, where 10 innocent persons were killed as several bombs were blasted in the Barshabaran programme (traditional programme to welcome the first day of Bengali New Year) on April 14, 2001.
Those who were convicted to death are- Mufti Abdul Hannan, Moulana Akbar Hossain, Mufty Abdul Hye, Moulana Jahangir Alam Badar, Moulana Abu Bakkar, Mufty Shafiqur Rahman, Moulana Tajuddin and Arif Hasan Suman.
The persons who were sentenced to life imprisonment are Moulana Abu Taher, Moulana Sabbir, Moulana Yahaya, Moulana Showkat Osman, Moulana Abdur Rouf and Sahadatullah Jewel.
Of the death-row-convicts, banned militant outfit Harqat-ul Jihad al-Islami (HuJI) chief Mufti Abdul Hannan was executed in 2017, in another case. Moulana Akbar Hossain, Arif Hasan Suman and Moulana Abu Bakkar are now behind bars and the rest of the death-row-convicts are yet to be arrested.