The High Court has directed the Dhaka Metropolitan Special Tribunal 2 to probe the incident of a day labourer named Md Liton falling prey to mistaken identity and getting arrested.
The court also asked to release the 30-year-old if proven found not guilty.
Dhaka Metropolitan Special Tribunal 2 has 15 days to conduct the investigation and 30 days to submit its findings.
The bench of Justice Tariq-Ul Hakim and Justice SM Kuddus Zaman passed the order after hearing a writ petition filed over the matter virtually on Tuesday.
Advocate ZI Khan Panna, accompanied by advocate Yadia Zaman and advocate Shahinuzzaman Shahin stood for the writ.
Earlier on August 24, a writ was filed with the High Court seeking the immediate release of wrongfully arrested Md Liton.
The rights organization Ain o Salish Kendra (ASK) and the victim in question, Md Liton, filed the writ with the High Court, with a clipping of a news report that brought the issue to light attached to it.
The writ also sought the High Court’s directive to have Liton present before the court virtually or physically to ensure his identity, and to order his immediate release and to have his imprisonment declared illegal.
The home secretary, inspector general of police, inspector general of prisons, deputy commissioner of Bhola and the district’s superintendent of police have been made respondents to the writ, among others.
According to media reports, police arrested the day labourer on December 7, 2019, confusing him with 41-year-old convict Md Liton, because their names, fathers’ names and addresses were the same.
Both the Litons’ fathers’ name is Nur Islam, and they are both from Chotla village in Dhouligournagar union of Lalmohan upazila in Bhola.
The convict Liton was arrested on June 28, 2009, along with two others in Paltan, Dhaka, for carrying an anaesthetic drug that is illegal in Bangladesh.
After securing bail, the 41-year-old Liton and his two cohorts went into hiding.
On October 22, 2014, the Dhaka Metropolitan Special Tribunal 2 sentenced the trio to two years’ rigorous imprisonment and fined them Tk2,000 each.
A media report quoting Saiful Islam, brother of the currently imprisoned Liton, said police had wrongly identified the 30-year-old whereas the real criminal was in hiding.
He said his brother lived in the village, while the other Liton lived in Dhaka.