A prosecution witness, also the wife of a martyred physician who was killed by Al Badr, a vigilante group of Jamaat-e-Islami, at the fag end of country’s Liberation War in 1971, on Monday prayed for capital punishment of her husband’s killers.
“I want death sentence of those responsible for killing my husband along with the intellectuals under a planned scheme to intellectually bankrupt the Bangalee nation prior to the Independence of Bangladesh,” said Syeda Salma Mahmud with tearful eyes while testifying against accused Jamaat-e-Islami ameer Motiur Rahman Nizami before the International Crimes Tribunal-1 as PW-23.
She said that on November 15 morning during the 1971 Liberation War, her husband Dr Azharul Huq along with Dr Humayun Kabir, a next door neighbour, at Hatirpool Free School Street in the capital, was picked up at gun point from in front of their rented house by a group of Al Badr. Later, their bodies — blindfolded and hands tied from behind — with multiple injuries were found lying under the drain near the Notre Dame College culvert.
“Before the incident, my husband had been waiting for ambulance from Dhaka Medical College Hospital to go there to join duty as during the time the entire Hatirpool and its surrounding areas were cordoned off by the Pakistan occupation army along with the members of Al Badr,” Salma recalled.
She said, “During the operation, members of Al Badr had searched my house, including bedroom, and interrogated me about my husband’s movements and activities.
“When I wanted to know their identity, they boastfully introduced them as the members of Al Badr and said they had come to pick up my husband at the behest of their high command Motiur Rahman Nizami,” she added.
PW Salma said that during the Liberation War, her husband, an assistant surgeon, had treated the injured freedom fighters at the Dhaka Medical College Hospital, at his private chamber at Hatirpool and at different places on call.
Salma, now 64, said: “We got married on February 15, 1970 and during the happenings I was six months pregnant.” After the independence, she gave birth to a son, she added.
Before concluding her deposition, PW-23 identified Jamaat chief Nizami in the dock.
The defence counsel will cross-examine PW Salma on Wednesday.
Source: UNB Connect
“I did not see the killing by my own eyes. But many people told me later on”=Government coached STATE WITNESS in Kangaroo Circus in Dhaka