UNB, Dhaka :
A freedom fighter prosecution witness (PW), also member of a Liberation War victim’s family, on Sunday accused Engineer A Jabbar of Mathbaria, Pirojpur of perpetrating crimes against humanity in 1971.
Recalling the 1971 October 6 atrocities, PW-16 Tikendra Nath Majumder, now 61, told the International Crimes Tribunal-1 that a group of armed Razakar at the behest of Engineer Jabbar had stormed their village Mathbaria and adjacent Angulkata and ransacked the houses in the area after carrying out arson attacks.
PW Tikendra said that after ransacking their house, the perpetrators had beaten the members of his family, including his grandfather, father, two uncles, two brothers and a domestic help, and took them as captives.
He further said that later, Razakars had taken them away. On way to village Suryamoni, Razakars had also picked up some other villagers and dumped them all on a river bank alongside the village. Tikendra said: “The following day, I came to know that Razakars had killed most of the 37 captured people including my grandfather, father and two uncles, while eight others including my two siblings escaped death with bullet injuries.”
He also said the perpetrators had released 7 captive villagers in exchange of money.
The PW-15 will be cross-examined by the state defence counsel today. On August 14, the tribunal framed charges against the fugitive accused Engineer Abdul Jabbar for his involvement in crimes against humanity during the Liberation War, after fulfilling the legal requirement of law for trying a fugitive accused, including the appointment of state defence counsel.
On May 11, the prosecution submitted to the ICT Registrar the proposed charges accusing Engineer Jabbar of perpetrating the crimes against humanity during the Liberation War.
The prosecution pressed five counts of war crimes charges against the former Jatiya Party MP, believed to have been living in the USA. After working for over 11 months, the investigation officer (IO) of the case ASP M Helal Uddin submitted the investigation report to the prosecution on April 29.
The prosecution submitted a list of 44 witnesses (PWs) to prove the charges as proposed against Jabbar.
The investigator ‘found’ Jabbar’s involvement in crimes like killing, genocide, arson, looting and forcefully converting many Hindus to Muslims in the then Mathbaria thana of Pirojpur during the war. Jabbar had been made chairman of local thana Peace Committee (collaborator) and he then organised Razakar outfit in Mathbaria, according to an investigation report.
Octogenarian Jabbar of Khetachhira under Mathbaria was the vice-chairman of Jatiya Party. He had joined the Pakistan Muslim League through his father-in-law, Arshed Ali, who was an influential Muslim League leader.
Jabbar later joined the Jatiya Party of Gen (retd) HM Ershad and was twice elected Member of Parliament with the party tickets in 1986 and 1988.
