Charges pressed against 801 BDR soldiers, 23 civilians

BDR REBELLION
Charges pressed against 801 BDR soldiers, 23 civilians
The Criminal Investigation Department on Monday pressed charges against 801 soldiers and 23 civilians for committing criminal offences, including murder and robbery, during the soldiers’ rebellion at the Bangladesh Rifles headquarters in Dhaka in February 25-26, 2009 that killed 74 persons, including 57 army officers.
CID’s senior superintendent Fazlul Kabir, on behalf of the investigation officer of the case, Abdul Kahhar Akhand, also special superintendent of the CID, handed the chargesheet over to the Dhaka chief metropolitan magistrate’s court.
This is the first case in the country in which so many people have been chargesheeted.
Twenty-one of the 824 people named in the chargesheet are still in hiding, it stated.
The 23 civilians named in the chargesheet include former Bangladesh Nationalist Party lawmaker Nasiruddin Ahmed Pintu, Hazaribagh Awami League leader Torab Ali and Dhaka City Corporation councillor Suraiya Begum.
They face all 25 charges pressed against the soldiers, as they have been charged with helping the soldiers in committing 25 offences.
Charges of masterminding the rebellion and hatching conspiracies against the state were also pressed against them.
Twenty-five charges were pressed against the soldiers under 25 sections of the Penal Code. The charges are – criminal conspiracy under Section 120B, waging war against the state through the rebellion at the border guards headquarters in Dhaka that spread to 61 other installations of the borders guards across the country under Section 121, conspiracy against the state under Section 121A, sedition under Section 124A, murder under Section 302, attempt to murder under Section 307, rioting under Section 148, committing offences by forming unlawful assembly under Section 149, causing injuries to deter public servants from their duties under Section 332, causing grievous injuries to deter public servants from their duties under Section 333, assault or use of criminal force to deter public servants from their duties under Section 353, wrongful confinement of officers and their families under Section 342, wrongful confinement of officers and their families for three or more days under Section 345, causing injuries to officers and their families under Section 324, causing injuries to officers and their families under Section 324, causing grievous injuries to some of them under Section 325, causing grievous injuries to some of them with deadly weapons under Section 326, mischief by fire or explosion under Section 436, mischief under Section 427, theft under Section 380, preparation for theft under Section 382, destroying evidence by burying the slain officers in mass graves and hiding some of them in manholes or in drains under Section 201, committing offences in connivance with each other under Section 114, helping each other to commit the offences under Section 109 and committing the offence with a common intention of creating anarchy under the conspiracy.
The CID submitted about 5,000-page chargesheet one year and four months after it began investigation in the case.
After the submission of the chargesheet, the investigation officer of the case, Abdul Kahhar Akand, at a briefing at the CID headquarters said that 200 CID officials had been involved in the investigation.
The chargesheet named as prosecution witnesses 1,079 people. Six army officers, 68 family members of the victims, 182 BDR soldiers, 15 journalists, 110 general citizens, 5 explosives experts, 202 policemen, 10 fire fighters, 3 Red Crescent men, 57 Rapid Action Battalion personnel, 230 persons who prepared the seizure lists, a magistrate who conducted the trace identification parade, 32 magistrates who recorded the confessional statements, 102 persons who identified the bodies and prepared inquest reports, 37 doctors, 3 persons who prepared sketch maps and the complainant and the investigation officer of the case were made witnesses. The 14 other witnesses include ministers, the chiefs of the army, air force and navy and others.
The then officer-in-charge of the Lalbagh police, Nabajyoti Khisha, filed the case with the Lalbagh police station on February 28, 2009 accusing about 1,000 BDR soldiers of committing criminal offences during the rebellion. The case was later transferred to the New Market police.
Later, 2,328 people were made accused in the case. Of them 2,307 were arrested and the rest 21 went into hiding, the chargesheet mentioned.
Of the arrested, 2,282 were remanded in custody and interrogated by the CID. Confessional statements of 543 were recorded.
The CID also interrogated the prime minister, Sheikh Hasina, and a number of ministers, Kahhar Akand said.
‘We have found no political or international connections in the massacre,’ he said.
The chargesheet put forward 824 suspects for trial and recommended that the rest of the accused persons could be relieved of the charges as the investigation could not prove the charges against them.
Most of them, however, might not be released immediately as most of them are facing mutiny charges under the Bangladesh Rifles Order 1972.
An inter-ministerial meeting on September 15, 2009 decided to hold trial of the BDR rebellion under the Bangladesh Rifles Order and the trial of other criminal offences committed during the rebellion under the speedy trial tribunal under the Penal Code.
The government came up with the decision on the law and the mode of the trial of the cases in line with the observations made by the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court in its reply to the presidential reference on the issue.
In its reply to the reference, the Appellate Division categorically said the BDR rebellion cases could not be tried under the Army Act and not even by issuing a notification under Section 5 of the act applying it to the Bangladesh Rifles with a retrospective effect.
The government on November 15, 2009 formed six special courts under the Bangladesh Rifles Order for trial of the BDR soldiers facing charges of mutiny in about 40 cases filed across the country.
Trial of the BDR mutiny cases began on November 24, 2009 with a special court at the Rangamati sector headquarters taking cognisance of mutiny charges against five soldiers of the 12 Rifles Battalion.
The special courts have so far sentenced 201 BDR soldiers to jail for different terms varying from one to seven years in five cases in Panchagarh, Thakurgaon, Feni, Satkhira and Rangamati on munity charges.

Courtesy of NewAge