War crimes accused Motiur Rahman Nizami was present at the scene when Pakistan soldiers and al-Badr cadres had killed around eight unarmed civilians and burnt several houses of Brishalikha village in Santhia of Pabna during the 1971 Liberation War, a prosecution witness has claimed.
Shahjahan Ali, 69, also alleged that the army killed his uncle with the help of local razakars (collaborators) in presence of Nizami, the chief of Jamaat-e-Islami.
Nizami was indicted on 16 counts of crimes against humanity allegedly committed in Pabna and Dhaka. The charges include genocide, rape, torture, abduction, confinement and conspiracy.
The witness gave his deposition on charge number seven. During the cross-examination, heated arguments took place between the prosecution and the defence over some inconsistencies in information the witness gave.
The charge states: “On December 3, on receiving information from Nizami and the razakars, the Pakistani Army soldiers surrounded Brishalikha and picked up Sohrab Ali from his house around 5:30am. He was brought to the main road and tortured and was asked about his son Mohammad Abdul Latif Selim. Failing to extract information, they shot and killed Sohrab in the presence of his wife and children.”
However, Shahjahan in his deposition said on that day, some people including Rafikunnabi Bablu and Asad had gone to his house and dragged his uncle out of his room to the road.
The witness, his uncle’s wife and other family members had seen this but after some time, Shahjahan asked his aunt and others to go home while he followed the abductors. He then said he witnessed the killing of his uncle in the presence of Nizami while hiding in a bamboo-thicket. The witness also said after he had gone home, he did not tell anyone about his uncle’s death.
Later he went to the spot with some teenagers and returned home with the body.
He said in August of 1971, some razakars had captured his cousin, Alauddin, and Abdus Salam Latif from a local food storage and handed them over to the soldiers, who tortured them. They returned home with serious injuries.
The witness identified Nizami in the dock and said he knew Nizami since 1970 when he had worked for the elections as a member of Awami League. “Nizami came to our village for election campaigns on behalf of Jamaat-e-Islami candidate Anwarul Islam,” he said.
During the cross-examination, defence counsel Mizanul Islam asked the witness whether the prosecution had given him any written documents. Asked three times, Shahjahan replied in the affirmative.
Then the prosecution claimed that the witness could not understand the question. Following this, the witness also said he had not understood the question. With this, both the parties argued for around 15 minutes before the tribunal intervened.
“We did not hear the answer of the witness,” Justice Jahangir Hossain said. Then Mizanul pleaded for the tribunal to scrutinise the video record. The tribunal said they would check it later.
Then the defence grilled the witness about his family members. Before lunch break, Mizanul pleaded for an adjournment. The tribunal, led by its Chairman Justice ATM Fazle Kabir, did not approve the plea.