Ashraf led torture of man maiming him for life

A prosecution witness yesterday testified that his father was disabled because Al-Badr men led by Ashraf Hossain tortured him in Jamalpur during the Liberation War of 1971.

Ainal Hossain, the 17th prosecution witness in the case against eight alleged Al-Badr men including Ashraf in Jamalpur, said his father had been tortured for seven to eight days before being released.

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Abdul Bari and Abdul Mannan were accomplices of Ashraf, he said.

The three are among the eight accused facing five charges. Of the rest Shamsul Haque and AKM Yusuf Ali are in jail, while Prof Sharif Ahammed, Harun, and Abul Hashem are on the run.

Meanwhile, war crimes accused Emdadul Haque died at Dhaka Medical College Hospital early yesterday due to old age complications, said the prosecution and police.

Emdadul, alleged chief of anti-liberation Peace Committee of Chunta Union in Brahmanbaria, was arrested from his house in Dhaka on January 6. He faced two charges, said Prosecutor Rezia Sultana Chaman.

The witness Ainal, 59, who lives at Banpara village of  Jamalpur sadar upazila, told the International Crimes Tribunal-1 that his father Ayub Ali Fakir was a night guard of Government Ashek Mahmud College's degree hostel in 1971 and they lived in an adjacent house.

In 1971, the hostel was turned into a camp of the anti-liberation Al-Badr force and its members used to torture people inside the camp, the witness said.

Ashraf, Bari, and Mannan were involved with the force, he added.

Ainal said his father used to supply information about Al-Badr camps to the freedom fighters.

In the first week of Bangla month Bhadra, Al-Badr men led by Ashraf abducted his father from their house and tortured him inside a tin-roof house beside the hostel, he said.

Ainal said he went to the college's vice principal Aziz and the three to request his father's release. He said Al-Badr men broke his father's left leg before releasing him after seven to eight days of torture.

Azizur Rahman, the 18th prosecution witness, said he heard that there were camps of the Pakistani army and Al-Badr at the Primary Training Institute of Jamalpur in 1971. He, however, did not mention name of any accused.

The two were cross-examined before the three-member tribunal led by Justice Anwarul Haque adjourned the proceeding till today.