21 August grenade attack: Death sentence awaits final disposal

On this day 19 years ago, a gruesome grenade attack was carried out in a rally of the then opposition leader Sheikh Hasina in Dhaka’s Bangabandhu Avenue.

A trial court gave verdict in the case filed over the incident some 14 years later.

The case now awaits the final disposal in the High Court. In the meantime, hearing on the approval of death reference and appeal has started in the High Court.

A partial hearing has been held over the appeal of the accused in two related cases (murder and explosives) with death reference by the High Court bench of justice Sahidul Karim and justice Md Mostafizur Rahman.

Attorney general AM Amin Uddin on Saturday told that paper books (details of case including case statement, chargesheet and judgment of trial courts) are prepared on a priority basis in preparation for death reference hearings.

Paper books reading is almost completed as about 30,000 pages have been read from the paper books and four to five hundred pages are left.

Attorney general said the hearing could not be held for the last several days as the senior judge of the bench has been ill.

He hoped the hearing would be completed within the next 12 to 15 working days.

A case requiring the approval of the High Court to execute the accused is known as a death reference case. Accordingly, the judgment of the trial court and other documents need to be sent to the High Court for approval of the death penalty.

Hearings on death references, prison appeals of accused, appeals and miscellaneous applications are usually held together. Paper books are to be created in preparation for the hearing.

The grenade attack in the Awami League rally in 2004 killed 24 leaders-activists of the party. Opposition leader of that time Sheikh Hasina and several hundred others were injured.

The then BNP-Jamaat coalition government took various steps to divert the investigation of the gruesome attack. New information came out as the caretaker government in 2007 re-investigated two related cases (murder and explosives).

In 2008, Criminal Investigation Department (CID) submitted a chargesheet in the case accusing 22 people including Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami leader Mufti Abdul Hannan. The chargesheet said militants carried out the attack to kill Sheikh Hasina and create a leadership crisis in Awami League.

The case was further investigated after Awami League came to power in 2009. Later a supplementary chargesheet was submitted accusing 30 more people, including Tarique Rahman.

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