The prosecution of the war crimes tribunal does not want to face any criticisms about their performance in the case against Delawar Hossain Sayedee who has been acquitted by the apex court yesterday in 15 out of 20 charges brought against him.
The prosecutors claim that they did their best without any negligence. Though, personally, many of them were discontent over the probe agency’s work. None of the prosecutors admitted to any fault or inefficiency in them.
When people were shocked upon hearing the final verdict, the prosecutors left the court room laughing while Mohammad Ali, conducting prosecutor in the trial against executed war criminal Abdul Quader Molla, passed a comment: “So far, I am the Hero.”
Another prosecutor Shahidur Rahman said: “We placed evidence, the tribunal gave the death penalty and finally the court convicted the accused.”
Hours after pronouncement of the final verdict, prosecutors of the case were seen chatting at the chamber of Syed Haider Ali, the main conducting prosecutor. They were happy with the verdict since the sentence did not bother them.
One of the members Abdur Rahman Hawlader mocked saying that his wife had called him after the verdict and asked him not to return home since Sayedee was not given the death penalty. She suspected that there were dealings under the table.
The whole prosecution team was complacent echoing the attorney general who said: “Sayedee’s mask has been unveiled following the verdict even though he presented himself as a very religious and innocent person at all times.”
One of the prosecutors quoting Sayedee said the Jamaat-e-Islami leader had claimed on the day of indictment that he was facing the greatest lie of this century. “But we have unveiled his face at least as it has been proved now that Sayedee forcefully converted Hindus to Islam and was involved in rape and torture of women during the 1971 Liberation War.”
After the pronouncement of the final verdict, the prosecution was not ready to face the media saying that the full verdict was yet to be published. They also declined invitations to speak on talk shows on television channels.
For their callous presentation, the prosecution has been facing criticism from the beginning of the trial.
Recently, even the apex court criticised the prosecutors during the hearing in the appeal case of Muhammad Kamaruzzaman.
When the attorney general failed to answer some questions of the Appellate Division bench, Justice SK Sinha reacted sharply saying: “I am really shocked to see your condition. Why do you allow such incompetent prosecutors? Bring some competent persons in.”
War crimes campaigners have long been demanding a reshuffle in the prosecution team so that competent counsels could run the cases, which to trial after more than 40 years of independence.
The case’s investigator, Md Helal Uddin, admitted that they had been immature during the probe. “It was the first case of the tribunal and we were not matured enough. We tried our level best.
“If we had started this case now, there would have been a different outcome.”
Sanaul Haque, senior official of the investigation agency, said his team had done a lot though and faced many “problems” to conduct the probe. He said: “Whatever mistakes we did, we will correct them in the future. We will be cautious in the next cases.”