Bangladesh HC commutes ULFA leader’s life term to 14 years imprisonment

Dhaka: Bangladesh High Court has commuted the life imprisonment of separatist ULFA leader Paresh Baruah to 14 years imprisonment in a case under the country’s Arms Act while acquitting several others.

“The two-judge bench commuted the life imprisonment of ULFA’s Paresh Baruah and four Bangladeshis,” an official of the attorney general’s bureau said on Wednesday.

United Liberation Front of Assam's (ULFA) now absconding military commander Baruah and several Bangladeshis, including former junior home minister and former military generals, civil officials and private citizens, were convicted of two charges in 2014 for their alleged attempt to smuggle 10-truck loads of weapons to ULFA hideouts in Assam.

On December 18 last year, the High Court commuted the death sentence of Baruah.

Baruah, who is believed to be living in China, was sentenced to death after a trial in absentia in 2014. His name also figures in the ‘most wanted’ list of India’s National Investigation Agency (NIA).

Ten truckloads of weapons were seized in April 2004 despite alleged efforts of certain “influential quarters” for its safe passage to ULFA hideouts in northeastern India through Chattogram, which was then spelled as ‘Chittagong’.

The seized weapons included over 27,000 grenades, 150 rocket launchers, over 11 lakh ammunition, 1,100 sub machine guns and 11.41 million bullets.

One case was filed under the Special Powers Act 1974 for smuggling of firearms and the other under the Arms Act for illegal possession of arms.

Former junior minister Lutfuzzaman Babar, ex-forces intelligence (DGFI) chief major general Rezzakul Haider Chowdhury, ex-managing director of a state-run fertilizer plant Mohsin Talukder, its general manager Enamul Hoque, former additional secretary of industries ministry Nurul Amin and Jamaat-e-Islami leader Motiur Rahman Nizami were handed down death penalty in the cases.

Baruah and four others were handed down life imprisonment in both the cases.

The bench said the prosecution could not prove the charges brought against all accused regarding actual control and possession of the firearms mentioned in the case.

“The conviction and sentence in criminal cases cannot be handed out without credible evidence,” a defence counsel quoted the court observation as saying.

Motiur Rahman Nizami, former Ameer of Jamaat-e-Islami Nizami, who was the industries minister of the then prime minister Khaleda Zia’s Bangladesh Nationalist Party-led alliance government too was handed down death sentence in the case.

However, in May 2016, he was executed in another case on crimes against humanity committed during the Liberation War in 1971.

Earlier on January 30, 2014, a special tribunal in the northeastern port city of Chattogram handed down the death penalty to 14 people, including two former ministers of the past BNP government, two ex-army generals and a top ULFA leader in the arms haul case.

Two cases – one under the Arms Act and another under the Special Powers Act – were filed at Karnaphuli police station a day after 10 truckloads of arms were seized at the Chittagong Urea Fertiliser Limited (CUFL) jetty on April 1, 2004. PTI AR GSP GSP