The trial proceedings of BNP's senior vice-chairman Tarique Rahman and 11 others involving charges of masterminding the August 21 grenade attack are now ready to begin any day.
Dhaka Chief Metropolitan Magistrate's Court judge Keshab Roy Chowdhury on Tuesday sent the case to Dhaka's Second Additional Sessions judge's court of Begum Chaman Chowdhury to start the trial.
The case involves a grisly attack on an Awami League rally in front of its party headquarters in Dhaka in 2004.
Then opposition leader Sheikh Hasina narrowly survived the attack but at least 24 party activists, including incumbent president Zillur Rahman's wife Ivy Rahman, were killed and 73 injured.
Keshab Roy's move came after the copies of the notices published in newspapers asking Tarique and other fugitives to surrender were submitted to his court on Tuesday.
The court of Chaman Chowdhury will now formally start the trial showing Tarique as a fugitive.
Keshab Roy on August 1 issued the order to publish the notices in newspapers. In line with legal parlance, Tarique is a fugitive as he is now in London and ignores the court order to return home to face the charges in the case.
Another court on August 11 had also ordered to publish notices in newspapers asking Tarique and 11 others charged under the Explosives Act in the same case.
The court of Keshab Roy on July 3 issued the arrest warrant against Tarique and 17 others hours after submission of supplementary charge sheets in the case.
Three former police chiefs and three former police investigators who are among the accused later surrendered to the court.
Tarique, who faces 14 cases on charges of corruption and extortion, is currently under treatment in the UK after being released in 2008.
The Awami League, however, claims Tarique masterminded the attack from Hawa Bhaban, Khaleda's political office in Gulshan, from where Tarique allegedly ran a parallel government during the BNP's 2001-06 tenure.
Source : New Age
