Members of Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) arrested a former local BNP leader who is a death row fugitive in a case filed in 1994 in Pabna following an attack on a train transporting Sheikh Hasina.
Jakaria Pintu was arrested from Cox's Bazar’s Teknaf on Saturday, Khandaker Al Moin, director of RAB’'s Legal and Media Wing, confirmed on Sunday.
Pintu informed RAB during his initial interrogation that he used to manage a criminal organization in the region.
He was also sentenced to 17 years in prison in an arms case while being charged in at least 17 more cases.
Pintu was said to be a powerful figure in his community as the secretary of the BNP's Ishwardi Poura section.
He ran as an independent candidate in a local election in Ishwardi in 2015.
In 2019, he escaped to India, only days after being convicted in the railway attack case.
However, he returned three years ago because his passport had expired.
Pintu has spent the last three years hiding in Dhaka, Rajshahi, Cox's Bazar, and other regions. Now, he was staying at a friend’s home in Teknaf.
On September 23, 1994, the then opposition leader Sheikh Hasina was traveling by train from Khulna to Syedpur and conducting rallies at several stations.
Her train was attacked with crude explosives and bullets as it approached Pakshey Railway Station in Ishwardi.
After 25 years, a Pabna court condemned nine BNP leaders and activists, including Pintu, to death and 25 to life imprisonment in 2019.
Thirteen additional offenders were sentenced to ten years in jail.
