Published : 14 Aug 2023, 09:24 PM
Updated : 14 Aug 2023, 10:50 PM
Jamaat-e-Islami leader Delwar Hossain Sayedee, who was sentenced to jail until death for war crimes, has died in prison custody at a Dhaka hospital
Sayedee died at 8:40 pm on Monday after suffering a cardiac arrest, said Brig Gen Rezaur Rahman, director of Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujib Medical University.
Officials at Kashimpur jail in Gazipur took the 83-year-old to Shaheed Tajuddin Ahmad Medical College Hospital on Sunday night after he had fallen ill. He was later shifted to the BSMMU.
BSMMU Director Rezaur said Sayedee had heart complications and diabetes.
The Jamaat leader had suffered a heart attack before being brought to the hospital and then another one after his admission there, according to Rezaur.
The two sons of Sayedee were at the hospital and the body would be handed over to his family once the formalities are done, said the BSMMU director.
The law-enforcing agencies have beefed up security in the BSMMU area following Sayedee’s death, said Mohammad Salman Farsi, an assistant commissioner of Dhaka Metropolitan Police.
The International Crimes Tribunal handed down the death penalty to Sayedee in 2013 on two counts of crimes against humanity committed during the 1971 Liberation War.
These included murders and arson attacks on Hindu households in Pirojpur.
The Supreme Court in 2014 reduced Sayedee’s death sentence to imprisonment until death.
Dozens of people, including policemen, died in violence after the war crimes tribunal sentenced Sayedee to death. Attacks were carried out on Hindus.
The Supreme Court sentenced Sayedee to prison until death on three charges.
These included murders and arson in a Hindu neighbourhood, abduction and rape, and forcible conversion of Hindus.
Sayedee, at that time a youth of around 30 years of age, was known by the surname of Shikdar.
He became a member of the local Peace Committee, an infamous social platform mobilised centrally by right-wing political parties opposed to Bangladesh’s independence.
He came to prominence during the war apparently because of his fluency in Urdu and went on to lead the local Razakar units on a number of raids, the International Crime Tribunal said in its verdict.
In Jamaat, he was the Nayeb-e-Amir, or chief’s deputy. He was popular among Jamaat supporters for his Islamist lectures.
