A court in Sylhet has ordered life imprisonment for one and four years in jail for a second convict for the 2018 murder attempt on Prof Muhammed Zafar Iqbal.
Judge Nurul Amin Biplob of the Sylhet Anti-Terrorism Tribunal on Tuesday convicted key accused Faizul Hasan and his friend Shohag Mia over the attack on the campus of Shahjalal University of Science and Technology (Sust) four years ago.
Faizul, who has been sentenced to life term, and Shohag were also fined Tk20,000 and Tk5,000, respectively.
The court acquitted Faizul's father Maulana Atiqur Rahman, mother Minara Begum, brother Enamul Hasan and maternal uncle Md Fazlur Rahman as the charges against them had not been proven beyond a reasonable doubt.
The court in its verdict observed that some vested quarters are inciting militant behaviour and spreading extremist ideologies among youths “in the virtual world by tempting them with shortcuts to heaven”.
Prof Zafar was speaking at an open air event on the Sust campus when he was stabbed in the back of his head on March 3 that year. Faizul, a madrasa student, was detained from the scene at the time.
The Sust administration filed a case with Jalalabad police station in this connection the next day.
The professor made a full recovery after getting treated at Combined Military Hospital in Dhaka for 11 days.
Over the few days following the attack, Faizul’s parents, his uncle and brother were detained in Sylhet and Gazipur and remanded in custody for different terms.
Faizul’s brother Enamul at that time admitted that he had been aware of Faizul’s involvement in militancy.
Faizul also confessed before a magistrate that he had been inspired to attack Zafar after watching extremist content on YouTube.
Police pressed charges against six on July 16, 2018.
Recording of witness testimonies in the case ended on March 10.
Our Sylhet correspondent Md Serajul Islam contributed to this report
