Police claim to have arrested one of the eight wanted men who had sexually assaulted women and children during the Pohela Boishakh celebrations in Dhaka University area on April 14 last year.
A team of the Detective Branch of police arrested Mohammad Kamal, a small trader, from a house at Khaji Dewan of Chawkbazar area on Wednesday evening based on a tip-off. The informer would get Tk1 lakh for helping the police with the information.
Police yesterday said that Kamal and the seven other alleged perpetrators who were recognised from CCTV footage sexually assaulted women at the Suhrawardy Udyan gate near the TSC intersection. While releasing their apparently blurred photographs on May 17 last year, the police chief declared Tk1 lakh bounty for each of them.
Kamal was placed on a two-day remand yesterday after DB Sub-Inspector Dipak Kumar Das produced him before the court of Dhaka Metropolitan Magistrate Abdullah Al Masud.
Police claimed that Kamal had admitted his involvement in the incidents of sexual assaults during primary interrogation. Kamal also claimed that he did not know the seven other people and that he had been loitering in the area alone.
DB Deputy Commissioner Masrukur Rahman Khaled said that Kamal, who had beard on his face at that time, had it shaved clean now. He went into hiding after the footage was aired by some TV channels.
The investigation officer of the case who had submitted final report on December 13 filed a plea with the Women and Children Repression Prevention Tribunal 3 yesterday to revive the case.
Tribunal Judge Joyasri Samaddar fixed February 23 for hearing in the case and directed the investigators to produce the accused before it on that day.
Earlier, the police released two of the eight alleged attackers after they had gone to the police station along with a woman on July 7 last year. The woman said that she was a victim of sexual harassment on April 14 and that the duo had been trying to save her from the offenders.
According to media reports, at least 20 women and children were sexually assaulted by several gangs of stalkers on that day. Some youths of Bangladesh Chhatra Union, including its DU unit President Liton Nandi, caught two of the assaulters and handed them over to the police. But they were later released.
In one of the incidents noticed from CCTV footage, four to five youths were trying to take off clothes of a woman while one or two came forward to save her.
Eyewitnesses alleged that at least seven women came under attacks near TSC and Matsya Bhaban areas in that afternoon. The attackers were honking vuvuzelas during the assaults to suppress the victims’ screams while some of them filmed the incidents with inhuman enthusiasm.
The mass sexual assaults created much hype all over the country as well as among Bangladeshis staying abroad. Different groups staged series of demonstrations demanding the arrest of the culprits and dozens of them were injured as police charged batons on a procession.
The demonstrators even blamed radical Islamists for carrying out the attacks in a planned way who think that celebrating the first day of the Bangla calender is anti-Islamic.
On April 15, police filed a case against unnamed persons with Shahbagh police over the incidents. No victim filed any complaint with the police as yet.
At the primary stage, the police and the DU authorities denied having any evidence of sexual assaults while DMP Commissioner Asaduzzaman Miah termed the incident merely scuffle. He also blamed media for exaggerating the issue.
Following investigation, police probe bodies found DMP Assistant Commissioner Sahedur Rahman, Inspector of Shahbagh police station Saidul Haque Bhuiyan and Sub-Inspector of the police station Ashraf responsible for negligence. Ashraf was suspended in mid-April for his negligence. AC Sahedur who was on duty in TSC area on that day could not fathom out the importance of the incident. SI Ashraf and Inspector Saidul released the two assaulters without discussing it with their senior authorities. However, no action was taken against the two others.
On May 17, police chief AKM Shahidul Haque told reporters: “We have been able to recognise the faces of eight people but we do not know their names or whereabouts. Anyone who comes forward and helps in the capture of an assaulter will be given Tk1 lakh as reward.”
Failing to capture anyone of them, police submitted the final report on December 13 saying that they had found the allegations of sexual harassment as true but they could not arrest the eight suspects due to lack of information on them.