Two people were punished, tortured and harassed because they did the right thing, and someone else, who did the exact opposite, was awarded with a presidential medal.
On the night of April 1, 2004, it was Sergeant Alauddin and Sergeant Helal Uddin Bhuiyan, who discovered that 10 truckloads of arms and ammunition were being smuggled through the Chittagong port.
They risked their lives to challenge the people offloading the ammo onto trucks from two trawlers at the Chittagong Uria Ferliser Limited jetty.
They were told that the authorities were aware of the “goods” being offloaded and threatened with dire consequences. They were also told that the arms and ammunitions were being transported for the separatist Indian group United Liberation Front of Assam (Ulfa).
However, Alauddin and Helal braved the threats and called in security reinforcements to round up the smugglers and the arms stash.
However, instead of being rewarded for bravery, these two sergeants were framed in fake arms cases, fired from the force and brutally tortured in custody – during the tenure of the BNP-Jamaat-led four-party alliance government.
In 2005, two other men, nabbed with AK-47 rifles in Feni and Noakhali, told law enforcers that they got the weapons from Alauddin and Helal.
“Then, we were suspended and made accused for supplying those two with the rifles. We were tortured in custody as part of an attempt to twist the sensational cases [filed in connection with the 10-truck arms haul],” Alauddin recounted.
The torture in custody was so brutal that they had never been the same person again – neither physically nor mentally, Alauddin said. “One of Helal’s legs was broken.”
However, the two policemen were later proved innocent and got back their jobs in 2011 – during the tenure of the Awami League-led government.
At present, Alauddin is serving as an inspector of the Special Protection Battalion (SBPn) at Ganabhaban – the prime minister’s official residence – and Helal as a traffic sergeant with Chittagong Metropolitan Police (CMP).
According to Alauddin, on the night of the arms haul, they, along with other policemen, picked up five suspected Ulfa men from the jetty area.
He and Helal later came to learn that the five men they had rounded up were later released from the custody of Abdullah Hel Baki, the then DC (port) of CMP.
“We mentioned the names of those five in our first information report. But, they were freed. Later, we were forced to tear up some of the pages of the FIR. There were some indirect pressures for concealing Ulfa’s connection with the haul,” Alauddin described.
Additional Superintendent of Police Md Moniruzzaman, investigation officer of the 10-truck arms haul cases, said the release of those five men and the framing of the two sergeants were part of attempts to hide the involvement of Ulfa and the higher authorities of Bangladesh with the smuggling.
Abdullah, who played an obedient role to the then government by releasing the Ulfa men and hiding facts, was awarded with the President Police Medal in 2005 – the same year Alauddin and Helal were framed with false arms cases, fired from the force and tortured in custody.
Sources from the police said not just the medal, DC Abdullah and his assistant Mahmudur got a number of promotions and recognitions during the BNP-Jamaat-led government’s tenure.
“We seized the biggest ever arms haul in the country’s history; yet we were made victims. Someone else took all the credits and also got all the recognitions, although he was guilty of hiding facts and letting suspects go. He did those following the then government’s orders,” Alauddin continued.
If the five Ulfa men were not released, the investigation would not have taken such a long time, said ASP Moniruzzaman, investigation officer of the arms haul cases.
Abdullah Hel Baki is currently an additional deputy inspector general of police and Mahmudur a superintendent of police in the Sylhet range. Both have been made officers on special duty (OSD).
A special Chittagong court yesterday sentenced 14, including two cabinet members – Matiur Rahman Nizami and Lutfozzaman Babar – of the then BNP-led 4-party alliance government, to death in connection with the arms haul.