Published : 04 Apr 2017, 04:47 PM
Updated : 11 Apr 2022, 09:01 PM
On Tuesday, Justice Jahangir Hossain Selim and Justice Md Jahangir Hossain sentenced the two convicts -- Omar Sharif and Mintu Khan -- to life in prison.
They were slapped with a Tk 50,000 fine each. They have to serve two more years in jail in case of failing to hand over the money to Rakib’s family.
“It has been found through evidence that the offenders tried to save the boy,” said the court.
Both Rakib’s father Nurul Alam Hawlader and the defence counsel will move to the Appellate Division against the verdict.
Rakib used to work at a motor workshop owned by Sharif in Khulna’s Tutpara. Sharif and his uncle Mintu got enraged after he left the job.
On Aug 3, 2015, they inserted a high-pressure air pump nozzle into his rectum. The high air pressure tore the 12-year-old boy’s intestines, rectum and bladder causing profuse internal bleeding in the stomach.
The incident shocked the nation and calls to bring the perpetrators to justice reverberated across the country.
In November the same year, a Khulna court handed death penalty to Sharif and Mintu.
Advocate Salma Sultana who is fighting the case for Rakib’s family said the court’s statements were self-contradictory.
“Anyone would die if air is inserted through his or her rectum. It is common sense,” she said.
Sharif’s lawyer Golam Md Chowdhury said what they had received was “partial justice”.
“The offenders did not flee. They took him to hospital. The murder was not intentional.”
Sharif’s mother Beauty Begum has been acquitted in the case as the allegations against her could not be proven.
