For the sixth time, a Dhaka court rescheduled the date for submitting the investigation report in the murder case of Inqilab Moncho spokesperson Sharif Osman Hadi, setting 15 February as the new date for submission.
On Monday, Dhaka’s Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Jashita Islam set the new submission date after the Police’s Criminal Investigation Department (CID) failed to submit the report.
Court sources indicate that investigating officer, CID Assistant Police Superintendent Abdur Kader Bhuiyan, requested more time after failing to submit the report. SI Ruknuzzaman from the Prosecution Department confirmed the matter.
Previously, on 3 February, the submission date had been postponed for a fifth time.
Sharif Osman Hadi, who had announced his candidacy as an independent for the Dhaka-8 constituency in the upcoming parliamentary election, was shot in the head while he was campaigning in the Bijoy Nagar area on 12 December.
Assailants on a moving motorcycle targeted him with gunfire. He had been initially taken to Evercare Hospital in the capital’s Bashundhara area before being moved to Singapore in critical condition for advanced treatment.
Osman Hadi passed away on 18 December while undergoing treatment in Singapore.
Initially, after concluding its investigation, Detective Branch (DB) submitted a charge sheet on 6 January, naming 17 accused including former ward councilor Taizul Islam Chowdhury Bappi and former Chhatra League activist Faisal Karim Masud.
However, the plaintiff, Inqilab Moncho member secretary Abdullah Al Jabbar, expressed dissatisfaction with the investigation. The plaintiff’s side claimed that DB Police had shielded the masterminds.
After a “dissatisfaction” application was submitted in court on 15 January, the court directed the CID to further investigate the murder.
The previous charge sheet provided by DB Police stated that Hadi was killed in a planned manner due to political vendetta and to disrupt the upcoming election by spreading fear among voters. The main accused in the case, Faisal Karim Masud, along with four others, are currently at large.
While the remaining accused are in custody, the victim’s family and fellow partymen and women continue to wait for the CID report to finally learn of the circumstances that led to Hadi’s assassination.
Inqilb Moncho activists have expressed anger over the continuous delays to the investigation report, that too mere days before the election. They have demanded the swift identification of the real culprits and their subsequent arrest and trial.
