Jail Killing Case
Complete trial within shortest possible time
Urges Nasim
Participants at a discussion titled “Killing of four leaders in jail, politics of conspiracy by the anti-liberation force: present context†organised by Amra Muktijoddhar Santan in Dhaka Reporters Unity yesterday.Photo: STAR
Former home minister Mohammad Nasim yesterday appealed to the Supreme Court to complete the trial of the historic jail killing case within the shortest possible time to free the nation from the associated “stigma”. Nasim, son of Captain Mansur Ali, one of the four national leaders assassinated in Dhaka Central Jail on November 3, 1975, referred to the long delay in the trial proceedings. “This is not my personal grief but of the whole nation's,” he said. The ruling Awami League leader was speaking at a discussion, “Killing of four leaders in jail, politics of conspiracy by the anti-liberation force : present context”, in Dhaka Reporters Unity of the capital. Amra Muktijoddhar Santan organised the discussion marking Jail Killing Day. The Metropolitan Sessions Judge's Court of Dhaka in 2004 awarded death sentence to three former army personnel and life imprisonment to 12 others. The High Court in 2008 upheld the death penalty of one, acquitted six of the convicts and did not say anything about the eight others. The government on Thursday appealed to the SC to uphold the lower court verdict by cancelling the HC verdict. "They were self-proclaimed killers and I myself had given testimony in this case," said Nasim, adding that the HC verdict made the trial “farcical”. “If the trial is not completed within the tenure of the present government and BNP-Jamaat comes to power, the trial would be farcical again,” he said. About BNP Chairperson Khaleda Zia's reverse stance on relations with India, Nasim said, “What she said (during her recent New Delhi visit) was just for the sake of saying it. She would surely return to her party's previous stance.” Terming BNP's politics as “politics of anti-India and communalism”, Nasim said Bangladesh would become an “extension of Pakistan” if Khaleda came to power again. State Minister for Liberation War Affairs Capt (retd) AB Tajul Islam and Krishak League leader MA Karim spoke at the discussion with Amra Muktijoddhar Santan President Humayun Kabir in the chair.
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