Salauddin Quader Chowdhury and Ali Ahsan Mohammad Mojaheed were
hanged early today for committing crimes against humanity during the
country's Liberation War.
The two walked the gallows around 12:55am together at Dhaka Central
Jail amid tight security, Brig Gen Syed Iftekhar Uddin, inspector
general (prisons), told The Daily Star.
The death sentences of Salauddin and Mojaheed, both former ministers,
were executed three days after the Supreme Court dismissed his petition
to review his capital punishment, originally handed down by two war
crimes tribunal in 2013.
Salauddin, self-proclaimed brigadier of Chittagong in 1971, was not
involved in politics in 1971, but he actively took part in the election
campaign of his father Fazlul Quader Chowdhury, the then president of
anti-liberation Convention Muslim League in 17970.
During the war, Salauddin, along with his men and Pakistani
occupation forces, unleashed a cold-blooded savagery on five Raozan
villages in Chittagong, killing 111 Hindu men. His father and he blamed
the Hindu men for his father's defeat in 1970.
Salauddin did not even spare Nutan Chandra Sinha, a social worker and
philanthropist. He and his men killed Nutan, dragging him out of a
temple where he was praying at the time. He also accompanied the
Pakistan army men when the abducted Awami League leader Mozaffar Ahmed
and his son, who were later found dead.
Turing their Goods Hill house as a torture centre, Salauddin and his
men tortured freedom fighters and pro-liberation people during the war.
After the war, he fled to London, but returned in 1974. Like
Mojaheed, he joined politics after 1975 political changeover and became
lawmakers several times. He even became a minister during the Ershad
regime.
Mojaheed was the president of Islami Chhatra Sangha, the then
Jamaat-e-Islami's student wing towards the last part of 1971 and became
chief of infamous Al-Badr Bahini.
During the nine-month war, being the chief of the Chhatra Sangha and
Al-Badr, Mojaheed visited many districts and held meetings with his
followers to instigate them in annihilating freedom fighters as well as
pro-liberation people.
And towards the end of the Liberation War, Al-Badr men, under his
leadership, traced houses, systematically rounded up, tortured and
brutally killed the brightest luminaries -- professors, litterateurs,
journalists and doctors -- to cripple the country intellectually once
and for all.
After independence, Mojaheed went into hiding and resurfaced after
the political changeover in the country with the assassination of
Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman. In time, his political clout grew,
and he even became minister of the country whose birth he
whole-heartedly opposed and tried to resist.
Their executions came after the president turned down the mercy petitions by both the convicts.
Around 8:30pm, the jail authorities called family members of the two
to meet the Salauddin and Mojaheed. The family members went to the Dhaka
Central Jail around 9:15pm, lawyers for both the convicts said.
Earlier in the afternoon, the two sought presidential mercy, the last
option to avoid gallows, through the jail authorities who in turn sent
the petitions to the home ministry.
From the home ministry, the petitions were forwarded to the law
ministry and then to the president through the Prime Minister's Office,
sources said.
Security was tight throughout the day around the Dhaka Central Jail
where the two convicts were kept, and it was further beefed up in the
evening when additional police and Rab and members were deployed.
All shops and establishments around the jail area were ordered to
shut down by 8:00pm and onlookers were asked to clear the area. The road
leading to the prison from Chawkbazar was closed around 7:40pm. Only
journalists were allowed to pass through the area to go near the jail
gate, that too after verifying their ID cards.
The countdown of their execution began after the Supreme Court
dismissed their review petitions on Wednesday. Family members of both
the death-row convicts met them at Dhaka Central Jail the following day.
Since yesterday morning, there were unconfirmed reports about their
possible execution last night. There was also confusion as to whether
they sought presidential mercy.
Around 10:00am, two executive magistrates went inside the jail to
know whether Salauddin and Mojaheed would seek mercy from President
Abdul Hamid.
Families of both the convicts held separate press conference where they expressed doubt that the two sought clemency.
At the press conference at Supreme Court Bar Association auditorium
around 12:00noon, Mojaheed's family members indirectly requested the
president to halt the execution until the end of the trial of August 21
grenade attack case, in which the Jamaat leader is an accused.
Salauddin's family members said he would convey his decision on seeking presidential clemency only when he meets his lawyers.
Later around 2:45pm, Law Minster Anisul Huq confirmed that the two indeed sought presidential mercy.
Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan Kamal also confirmed that both
Mojaheed and Salauddin conveyed their decision to seek mercy in front of
the two magistrates.
The mercy petitions reached his desk around 2:30pm, the minister told this newspaper around 5:00pm.
He said the petitions, labelled “Appeal for mercy” on top, were then being sent to the Prime Minister's Office.
But Hummam Quader Chowdhury, Salauddin's son, told reporters he was
not allowed to meet his father at the jail. “We don't know yet if he
filed any mercy petition.”
“We don't believe that our father sought mercy,” said Fazlul Quader
Fayaz, his other son. Mojaheed's son Ali Ahmed Mabrur said the same.
Salauddin's family also tried to submit a letter to the president
where they highlighted the international community's “opinion” on the
trial of the BNP leader.
Jamaat-e-Islami also claimed that the reports that Mojaheed filed for presidential clemency was “absolutely untrue”.
In a statement sent to the media at 2:50pm yesterday, Jamaat acting
secretary general Shafiqur Rahman called upon all concerned not to
spread “confusing and dirty propaganda” before the Dhaka Central Jail
authorities issued its official statement on this.
“Ali Ahsan Mohammad Mojaheed didn't say anything regarding seeking
clemency when his family visited him in jail. Family members told media
that he wants to consult his lawyers about next course of action,” the
statement reads.
Around 8:05pm, Law Secretary Abu Saleh Sk Md Zahirul Haque reached
Bangabhaban, the office-cum-residence of the president, with the
petitions.
Around 7:30pm, the law minister held a press briefing at his Gulshan
residence where he asserted that the mercy pleas were filed in
accordance with Article 49 of the Constitution -- the section relating
to the presidential clemency.