14 April 2017, Fri, 9:48

BDR mutiny: Verdict on death reference, appeals any day

The High Court will deliver its judgment any day on the death reference and the appeals of 152 convicts filed against the death penalty in the Pilkhana BDR mutiny case.

A three-member special HC bench, led by Justice Shawkat Hossain, on Thursday kept verdict on Curia Advisari Vult (CAV) after concluding hearing on the appeals and the death reference.
KM Zahid Sarwar Kajal, deputy attorney general, said the High Court heard the death reference and appeals for 370 working days. ‘The verdict will be pronounced any day,’ he said.

A Dhaka court on November 5, 2013, sentenced 152 soldiers of the erstwhile Bangladesh Rifles and two civilians to death, and 161 others to life imprisonment for their involvement in the BDR mutiny.
A total of 257 appeals were filed with the High Court against the lower court verdict.
Seventy-four people, including 57 army officials, were killed in the BDR mutiny on February 25-26 in 2009 at the Pilkhana headquarters in Dhaka.
The paramilitary force was later renamed Border Guard Bangladesh.