A total of 182 members of the signal sector of then Bangladesh Rifles now Border Guard Bangladesh were sentenced on Monday to various jail terms ranging from four months to seven years for their involvement in the February 25-26, 2009 mutiny at its Peelkhana headquarters in Dhaka. The Special Court-8 also fined each of the convicts Tk 100 and acquitted five as allegations against them were not proved.
Presided over by Brigadier General Abu Sayeed Khan, also deputy director general of BGB, the court delivered the two-hour-long judgement starting from 9:55am on the day at the makeshift courtroom at the Darbar Hall, the very site of the 2009 carnage. Two other members of the court were Lt Col Sirajul Huq and Major Jahidur Rahman Khan. Deputy Attorney General Biswajit Chakrabarty assisted the court as representative of the Attorney General.
The judgement was delivered on the 33rd working day of the trial in presence of all the accused in the courtroom.
Twenty of the convicts were jailed for seven years, three for six hours, 14 for five years, two for four years and six months, eight for four years, 16 for three years, 24 for two years, eight for two and six months, 32 for one year, 20 for one and six months, 30 for six months and five for four months.
Charges were framed against all the 187 BDR members of the signal sector on December 5 last year. Nayeb Subedar R M Mohammad Niamatullah Khandker filed the case with the Special Court-6 against 187 members of the BDR Signal Sector and later the case was shifted to the Special Court-8.
A total of 75 witnesses testified in the case.
A total of 73 people, including 57 army officers, were killed during the bloody mutiny at Pilkhana headquarters of the border guards on February 25-26 in 2009.
A total of eleven courts formed by government are holding the trial of the suspects on mutiny charges under the BDR law and on charges of various crimes committed during the mutiny in the headquarters and most garrisons of the border force across the country.
Courtesy of The Independent
