HC upholds death for five in Jahangirnagar University student Zubair murder

The High Court has upheld death sentences for five people convicted by a trial court in the 2012 murder of Jahangirnagar University student Zubair Ahmed.

The final-year student was killed in an attack on Jan 8 that year on the campus.

In 2015, the trial court sentenced five people to death and six others to life in prison— all of them activists of the university unit of Bangladesh Chhatra League or BCL, the ruling Awami League’s student affiliate.

On Wednesday, the court upheld life imprisonment for two convicts and acquitted four others.

The convicts awarded with capital punishment are Ashiqul Islam Ashique, Khan Mohammed Royees, and Zahid Hassan, Rashedul Islam Razu and Mahbub Akram.

All of them, except Razu, are on the run. His appeal challenging the trial court’s decision has been turned down.

The High Court upheld life imprisonment for molecular biology student Nazmus Sakib Tapu and philosophy student Ishtiak Mehbub Arup. Four others—Statistics Department’s Shafiul Alam Shetu and Avinandan Kundu, philosophy student Kamruzzaman Shohag and History Department’s Mazharul Islam have been acquitted.

All of them, except Arup, are in jail.

Zubair, an English Department student, was an activist of the BCL. He was hacked to death in an attack on the campus surrounding an internal feud on Jan 8, 2012.

After the death of Zubair, a student-teacher movement led to the resignation of then Vice-Chancellor Professor Sharif Enamul Kabir.

The erstwhile registrar of the university Hamidur Rahman filed the case for Zubair's murder with Ashulia Police. Investigation Officer Mir Shahin Shah Parvez pressed charges against 13 students of the 37th batch on Apr 8, 2012.

The case was transferred to Dhaka's Fourth Speedy Trial Tribunal on Aug 13 that year after it had reached the indictment stage.

On Feb 8, 2015, Judge Nizamul Haq of the tribunal sentenced five people to death and six others to life in prison and acquitted two.

The murder of Zubair is a result of unethical activities by student fronts active in public universities, the trial court said in its observation.

“Such acts bring miseries to the families of the victims. Violence, aggression, anarchy and disorder on the campus tarnish educational atmosphere,” the court said.

Perpetrators of campus violence were not brought to justice lately. As a result, more such incidents are occurring, the judge had said in his verdict.  

On Jan 9 this year, the High Court finished hearing death references and appeals by one of the death-row convicts and five convicts, who were sentenced to life in prison.

Death sentences that trial courts issue are forwarded as death references to the High Court for approval.