Six DU students accused of Tofazzal murder belong to Chhatra League
September 21, 2024
Bangladesh desk: Six students of Dhaka University’s Fazlul Huq Muslim Hall on Friday (September 20) gave statements to a court confessing their direct involvement in the lynching Tofazzal.
These six accused students were closely associated with Bangladesh Chhatra League (BCL), it is learnt. Of the accused, one was the Dhaka University’s Fazlul Huq Muslim Hall unit of BCL leader and the other faculty committee leader.
The six accused students are Md Jalal Mia, former Chhatra League leader of Fazlul Huq hall unit and a student of the Physics Department; Suman Mia of the Soil, Water and Environment Department; Mottakin Sakin of the Institute of Nutrition and Food Science, Al Hossain Sazzad of Geography and Environment Department; Wazibul Alam of Ocean Science Department; and Ahsan Ullah of the Department of Mathematics.
Jalal, a student of Physics, was former deputy secretary of science and technology affairs of the hall’s Bangladesh Chhatra League (BCL).
He resigned from Chhatra League to join the quota reform protests in July.
The six accused gave confessional statements to the court of Dhaka Metropolitan Magistrate Saddam Hossain under Section 164 of the CrPC on Friday confessing their involvement in Tofazzal murder. Later, the court ordered police to send them to jail.
Earlier, investigation officer (IO) of the case sub-inspector Aminul Islam produced the six accused before the court. Afterward, when the accused agreed to submit confessional statements, the IO pleaded to the court to record their confessions.
The students had allegedly mercilessly beaten Tofazzal inside the guest room of DU’s Fazlul Huq Hall on Wednesday night.
It is learnt that the students took Tofazzal to the guest room after catching him on charge of stealing a mobile phone. Then they had beaten him with thick sticks repeatedly on his head and other parts of the body till 10:00pm.
At one stage of beating, Tofazzal became very weak and felt very hungry. Then, beating was paused and he was taken to the hall canteen where he was fed rice and curry. Then the accused students resumed beating him.
Later, the house tutors of the hall went to the place of occurrence at after 10:00pm. Then several students took Tofazzal to the Dhaka Medical College Hospital (DMCH). When the on-duty doctors pronounced Tofazzal dead, the students left his body at the hospital.
As the DMCH authorities informed the Shahbagh Police Station, police went to the hospital and prepared a first information report of the dead body. After the postmortem at the morgue, Tofazzal’s body was handed over to his relatives.
Later, being the plaintiff, the DU authorities filed a murder case at Shahbagh Police Station in connection with the incident. After the case was filed, the investigation officer and senior officials of the Dhaka Metropolitan Police (DMP) visited the place of occurrence. Then the Dhaka University Proctorial Body handed over six DU students to Shahbagh Police Station suspecting their involvement in the murder.
Meanwhile, witnesses said former BCL leader Jalal hit Tofazzal many times. Several others were also involved.
A video showed that eight to 10 students of the hall including Jalal were beating Tofazzal mercilessly.
