A Dhaka court has discharged Narayanganj Jatiya Party (JP) lawmaker AKM Salim Osman from a case filed for assaulting and humiliating schoolteacher Shyamal Kanti Bhakta—in Narayanganj.
Dhaka Chief Judicial Magistrate AKM Emdadul Huq passed the order on Tuesday.
The court also indicted another accused, Md Opu, because the charge brought against him was proven.
Piyar Sattar Latif High School's headmaster, Shyamal Kanti, was beaten up on the school’s premises on May 13, 2016. Later, more people gathered at the school and demanded the headmaster be punished, after an announcement over the loadspeakers of local mosques stated that Shyamal had made derogatory comments about Islam.
Salim appeared at the scene and forced the teacher to do squats—while holding his ears as punishment for his “crimes.”
Thousands of people posted photos and videos of the incident on Facebook, expressing resentment over the teacher's humiliation.
Meanwhile, members of several radical Islamist parties, including Hefazat-e-Islam, demanded that the teacher be harshly punished—while militants linked to al-Qaeda threatened to kill him.
Shyamal Kanti was removed from his position on May 17, 2017 but the Education Ministry later reinstated him and dissolved the school’s managing committee.
The inquiry commission found that the assault of Shyamal Kanti was instigated by several members of the managing committee because of disputes regarding some development work.
