Bangladesh News

Militant kingpins Abdur Rahman and Siddiqul Islam alias Bangla Bhai yesterday filed ‘conditional’ applications seeking permission to appeal against their death penalty in the Supreme Court (SC) yesterday.

“They have told me that they have given their statements in the applications and said it is up to the Supreme Court whether it will consider those as appeals or not,” Deputy Inspector General (Prisons) Major Shamsul Haider Siddiqy told The Daily Star last night.

Another source said both Abdur Rahman and Bangla Bhai told the jail authorities that they wanted to give their depositions before the SC. If their pleas are granted, their applications could be granted as appeals, the source added.

Shamsul Haider said they would forward the applications–one containing seven pages and the other five pages — to the SC today.

Inspector General (Prisons) Brigadier Gen Zakir Hasan said Abdur Rahman and Bangla Bhai yesterday wrote their statements in prescribed forms supplied by the jail authorities and signed those.

Shamsul said Abdur Rahman wrote his statement in seven pages and Bangla Bhai in five pages and signed those prior to Iftar.

Asked about contents of the statements, he said he did not go through those properly. He however said the initial few pages that he went through mentioned about Islamic laws and rules of Allah.

Bangla Bhai’s elder brother Rafiqul Islam on Thursday submitted necessary papers to the sub-jail authorities in Mirpur for filing the application for leave to appeal.

Asked about this, Shamsul said they are yet to get any such papers.

He replied in the negative when asked whether any of Rahman’s relatives submitted necessary papers to the sub-jail authorities in Mirpur for filing the application for leave to appeal.

According to Jail Code, relatives of the condemned accused could meet them once a month but the rule was not followed as regards the seven condemned JMB leaders.

Asked about it, the DIG (prisons) said they would allow the relatives of the condemned accused to meet them in the next few days.

Earlier on Thursday, Khaled Saifullah, a Majlish-e-Shura (the highest policymaking body) member of banned Jama’atul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB), submitted his appeal through the authorities of Rangpur jail.

On May 29, a trial court in Jhalakathi handed down death sentences to the seven JMB leaders for killing two judges of the district court and on August 31, the High Court (HC) upheld the verdict. Of the convicts, Arifur Rahman is still at large while the rest are behind bars.

None of the militant leaders appointed any lawyer during their trial in the lower court and the HC saying that they are against the existing worldly juridical system and their move was to establish Islamic Shariah laws.

Iftekhar Mamun, who committed the murders through blasting bombs, has already filed jail appeal.

The other two — Ataur Rahman Sunny and Abdul Awalare yet to file any leave to appeal petition.