New Market mayhem: Five Dhaka College students put on remand over Nahid’s death

The Detective Branch (DB) of police has arrested five students of Dhaka College, who are also members of the college unit Bangladesh Chhatra League (BCL), over their suspected involvement in the murder of Nahid Mia.

The five arrestees are Abdul Kayum, 24, of accounting department, Polash Mia, 24, and Mahmud Irfan, 24, of social sciences department, Md Faisal Islam, 24, of Bangla department, and Md Zunaid Bugdadi, 19, of Islamic history and culture department, said DB Additional Commissioner AKM Hafiz Akter of Dhaka Metropolitan Police (DMP) yesterday.

“They directly took part in the attack [on Nahid] and overall violence. During the arrests, investigators also recovered the helmets they wore [when they clashed with traders],” he added. However, he did not confirm their BCL membership identities.

The DB official said the five had been detained from Dhaka and adjacent areas over the past two days but were shown arrested in the murder case on Wednesday.

A Dhaka court yesterday also granted police two days to interrogate the five.

The defence lawyers argued that they were regular students of good background who were arrested based on vague suspicions. "If they are remanded, their student lives and careers will be ruined," they said.

However, the court scrapped their petition against remand and gave the police two days to grill them.

Asked if the five were Chhatra League activists, Additional Commissioner Hafiz said: “The arrestees have told us that Dhaka College does not have a Chhatra League committee. Hundreds of students got involved in the clashes. So, a party or a group cannot be singled out.”

Regarding the so-called “Helmet Bahini,” he said: “They [arrestees] said that many of the students use motorcycles. They took up positions at the front [during the clashes] wearing their helmets.”

“We want to identify those who were present in the area during the clashes and bring them to book,” he added.

Nahid, 18, was one of the two persons who died at Dhaka Medical College Hospital after being attacked by agitators on April 19 during clashes between New Market area traders and Dhaka College students.

The other deceased was Md Mursalin, who worked at a shop in New Market.

Mahmud Hossain Opu/Dhaka Tribune

Since the clashes, five cases have been filed at the New Market police station. Of them, two were started on murder charges by the families of the two deceased, two by police and the fifth one by the owner of an ambulance that was vandalized. The DMP DB is investigating the two murder cases.

Police are yet to arrest another Nahid murder case accused, Emon Bashar, a Bangla department student of Dhaka College, who was seen in a video clip of the clash that went viral.

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Some video footage and photos showed that Nahid was lying still in front of Nur Jahan Super Market while a young man in a black helmet hacked him indiscriminately with a sharp weapon. The man in the black helmet was later identified as Emon.