BNP Secretary General Mirza Fakhrul walks out of jail with bail

BNP Secretary General Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir has been released from jail in a dramatic turn of events that saw him getting bail just four hours after he was ordered into prison.

He was denied bail in two out of three cases over violence and taken into judicial custody after he had surrendered at Dhaka’s Chief Metropolitan Magistrates Court on Wednesday.

His lawyers pleaded for a review of the decision on medical grounds and Fakhrul was granted bail around 4pm while he was still in jail.

“The BNP secretary general will be released from the court lockup,” Fakhrul’s counsel Sanaullah Mia told bdnews24.com immediately after the bail order.

But the senior BNP leader was brought to Dhaka Central Jail around 2:30pm, Prison Superintendent Mohammad Nesar Alam told bdnews24.com.

The process to release Mirza Fakhrul coud only start once prison authorities received the bail order.

“The bail bond has been signed. We will now head to the prison,” BNP’s Financial Affairs Secretary Abdus Salam told bdnews24.com around 5pm.

All of the drama - Fakhrul being sent to prison and granted bail - happened within a span of four hours.

Magistrate Golam Nabi had granted him bail in one of the three cases, but rejected his appeal in the others.

Just before his bail was cancelled, Fakhrul had been named BNP secretary general, having served as acting secretary general for five years.

The party rank and file had gathered at Naya Paltan headquarters to greet the new secretary general only to learn that he had been sent to prison.

In an immediate reaction, BNP leader Ruhul Kabir Rizvi, who has been promoted to senior joint secretary general on Wednesday, said it was part of a ‘deep conspiracy’.

Earlier, in the morning, Fakhrul’s elevation to the post of secretary general was announced at press conference at the BNP headquarters.

Within an hour of the announcement, Fakhrul, in keeping with a High Court order, surrendered at the CMM’s court, as the term of his bail was about to end.

Lawyers in the BNP fold greeted the party’s new secretary general with flowers at the court complex.

Fakhrul stepped out of prison close to 7pm to be greeted by hundreds of party leaders and activists.

Among the BNP’s central leaders present at the prison gate were Abdullah Al Noman, Abdus Salam, Shamimur Rahman Shamim, Rafiq Shikdar, SM Jahangir, Abdul Hasan Noni and Shayerul Kabir Khan.

Fakhrul waved to acknowledge their greetings and got into his car. The party leaders said he was on his way to meet Chairperson Khaleda Zia.

After spending almost six months in jail last year, pending trial, on violence charges, Fakhrul had secured interim bail from the High Court on health ground and went for treatment abroad.

On Wednesday, he secured bail in a January 2015 case. His bail appeals in two other cases, also lodged that very month, were rejected.

The High Court had granted him interim bail in the three cases related to violence that accompanied a movement by the 20-Party alliance in January 2015, the first anniversary of the general election it had boycotted. The court also issued a rule.

The State had challenged the order in the Appellate Division, which then upheld bail until the High Court’s rule was resolved.

The court had then instructed the BNP leader to surrender before the trial court once his bail expired.

On Nov 24, the High Court resolved the rule and granted Fakhrul three months’ bail.

The former minister then filed a petition to appeal against the order in an effort to secure permanent bail.

A Supreme Court bench headed by Chief Justice Surendra Kumar Sinha resolved his plea on Feb 29 and the BNP leader was told to surrender in 15 days.