A local local court here in Bangladesh handed down death penalties on Wednesday to four militants belonging to a banned Islamist group for murdering writer and Dhaka University professor Humayun Azad 18 years ago.
They shall be hanged by neck until they are dead, pronounced Dhaka's Additional Sessions Judge Mohammad Al Mamun as two of the convicts were on the dock while another two were tried in absentia as they are on the run to evade justice.
The judge ordered police to track down the fugitives and take steps to send them to the gallows, court officials said. All the convicts were operatives of outlawed Jamaatt-ul-Mujahideen (JMB).
Humayun Azad, a leading author and Bengali literature professor was stabbed and critically wounded on the Dhaka University campus when he was walking home from a book fair in February 2004. Police said three youths attacked him and exploded two bombs to make their escape.
Azad was initially treated at Dhaka's Combined Military Hospital (CMH) where his condition apparently improved and later he went to Germany for academic research works as well as further treatment but died days later. Azad's brother initially filed a case with police alleging unknown assailants tried to kill him but after his death the case was turned into a murder case as German doctor's reports and autopsy confirmed that he actually died because of the attack on him in Dhaka, when he lost a huge amount of blood due to deep injuries in his neck.
Azad earned the wrath of JMB and other militants and extremists because of his writings challenging bigoted thoughts. Days before the attack, he wrote a book critical of some Pakistanis for their role before Bangladeshi independence in 1971.
Azad's book Pak Sar Jamin Sad Bad was deeply critical of Pakistanis and their Bangladeshi collaborators before the independence of Bangladesh in 1971. 'Pak Sar Jamin Sad Bad' is also the first line of the Pakistani National Anthem.
Under Bangladesh law, the case will now be referred to the Supreme Court's High Court division for a mandatory review while the convicts will wait to exhaust the process.
