UNB, Gazipur :
Harkat-ul-Jihad (Huji) chief Mufti Abdul Hannan and his associate Bipul, two condemned convicts in a case filed over the grenade attack on ex-British envoy to Bangladesh Anwar Choudhury in 2004, filed petitions for presidential clemency on Monday.
Jail Super Mizanur Rahman of Kashimpur Central Jail, said Mufti Hannan made the plea around 5:45 pm while Bipul, an associate of Mufti Hannan filed the petition on Monday evening.
Earlier, on March 21, the SC verdict’s copy, upholding the death sentence of Mufti Hannan and two others in the case, was released. Later, the SC verdict was read out before Mufti Hannan and Bipul the following day.
The jail sources said the jail authorities are prepared for executing the verdict of the two Huji men in short time and the verdict will be executed after getting directive from the higher authorities concerned.
Earlier in the day, the death-row convict Delwar alias Ripon, who was kept at the Sylhet central jail here, in the case, filed a petition seeking presidential mercy. On March 19, the Appellate Division upheld the death sentence of Mufti Hannan, Ripon and Bipul the hearing of the review petition filed by the three death row convicts. It released the full text of its verdict on March 21. On December 7, 2016, a SC bench, headed by Chief Justice SK Sinha, upheld the death penalty of the three in the case rejecting appeals filed by the Huji chief and Bipul challenging the High Court verdict that had upheld their death sentence awarded by the tribunal.
On February 11, 2016, a High Court bench comprising Justice M Enayetur Rahim and Justice Amir Hossain delivered the verdict upholding the death sentence of the three. In 2004, the then British High Commissioner Anwar Choudhury came under a grenade attack while coming out of Hazrat Shahjalal’s shrine in his hometown Sylhet.
The envoy and 40 employees of the Sylhet district administration were injured in the attack.
Assistant sub-inspector Kamal Uddin died on the spot, while two constables-Rubel Ahmed and Habil Miah-succumbed to their injuries in a hospital.
