Md Shahjalal Howlader, whose eyes were gouged out in police custody in Khulna two years ago, was given bail on Monday, two months after he was convicted in a mugging case.
Khulna Metropolitan Sessions Judge Md Shahidul Islam issued the order after hearing his bail petition, filed by advocate Ashok Kumar Saha, Khulna coordinator of Bangladesh Legal Aid and Services Trust (BLAST), and human rights activist advocate Md Mominul Islam.
Shahjalal Howlader, who had been sentenced to imprisonment for two years in November last year, was released from Khulna District Jail around 7pm on Tuesday. His parents Md Jakir Hossain Howlader and Renu Begum received him at the jail gate.
Shahjalal was picked up by police on July 18, 2017, as a suspect in a mugging incident in the city’s Goalkhali area.
Later that night, he was admitted to Khulna Medical College Hospital (KMCH), his eyes having been gouged out.
Shahjalal said police had demanded money from his family after detaining him. And when his family could not pay them, they gouged his eyes out while torturing him.
Police however claimed that Shahjalal had lost his eyes in an incident of mob beating after he was caught in the act of mugging.
After he was admitted to hospital, on the same night a woman named Shoma Akhter filed a mugging case with police, accusing Shahjalal and another person of involvement in it.
On November 4 last year, Khulna Metropolitan Magistrate Amirul Islam sentenced Shahjalal to two years’ rigorous imprisonment in the case. The court also fined him Tk5,000, and in default, another month behind bars.
Shahjalal was sent to jail after the verdict.
After Shahjajal’s release on Tuesday, his father lamented: “There is no difference between prison and the open skies for my blind son now.”
Speaking to reporters, Shahjalal’s lawyer Md Mominul Islam said the court had set April 22 as the next date for hearing.
What really happened?
Before he was arrested, Shahjalal was a small businessman. He is from Subidpur village of Kawkhali upazila in Pirojpur. He used to live with his in-laws at Noyabati Rail Line Slum Colony in Khulna city’s Khalishpur area.
His mother Renu Begum, in a case she filed against the police after her son was injured, said on July 18, 2017, Shahjalal stepped out of the house around 8pm to buy milk for his daughter, when he was picked up by police on Khalishpur police station OC Nasim Khan’s instruction.
When his family went to the police station, the OC demanded Tk1.5 lakh in exchange for Shahjalal’s release.
When the family could not pay him the money, some policemen put Shahjalal in a police vehicle and took him away around 11:30pm.
“The next day, we found him in the Khulna Medical College Hospital, his eyes gouged out,” Renu said in the case statement.
Following the pronouncement of the verdict in November, Shahjalal said police officials took him to an isolated place near the Khulna Bypass Road in Goalkhali, where they tied his hands and legs, gagged him, and then gouged his eyes out with a screwdriver.
Renu filed a case with a Khulna court in connection with this incident on September 7, 2017, against 13 people, including 11 police personnel.
The accused are: then Khalishpur OC Nasim Khan, Assistant Sub-Inspector Rasel, Sub-Inspectors Taposh, Selim, Mizan, Nur Islam and Syed Shaheb Ali, Constable Al Mamun, Nayek Rezaul Hoque, Lance Nayek Abul Hashem, Ansar trooper Afsar, Shoma Akhter, and Md Russell.
After investigation, Khulna police did not find any evidence of wrongdoing on the part of the accused. The case was dismissed by the Khulna court.
Renu then moved the High Court against the lower court verdict. The case is still pending at the High Court.