A cyber tribunal yesterday deferred the announcement of the judgment in the case of the leak of the verdict in the case relating to the executed top war criminal Salauddin Quader Chowdhury to August 28. Judge KM Shamsul Alam of the Dhaka Cyber Tribunal declared the new date yesterday afternoon. The verdict of the case is not yet ready, the judge said in his order. The accused in the case are SQ Chowdhury’s wife Farhat Quader Chowdhury, son Hummam Quader Chowdhury, manager Mahbubul Ahsan, counsel Barrister Fakhrul Islam, Fakhrul’s assistant Mehedi Hasan, and War Crimes Tribunal office staff members Faruk Hossain and Nayan Ali. All of the accused are out on bail, except Mehedi Hasan, who is absconding.
Hummam Chowdhury was picked up by plainclothes policemen from the entrance of the Dhaka’s Metropolitan Sessions Judge’s Court on August 4, according to his family members. On February 15, the accused were indicted and the cyber tribunal recorded the statements of 21 out of 25 prosecution witnesses. The charges were submitted by the Detective Branch (DB) of the police on August 28, 2014. The accused connived to leak parts of the draft verdict from the tribunal chairman’s computer and upload it on different websites to make the war crimes trial controversial, according to the charge-sheet. It further states that SQ Chowdhury’s family invested a lot of money to leak the draft verdict.
Farhat Quader and Hummam Chowdhury were charged with conspiring and instigating the leak, while the lawyer Fakhrul Islam was charged with facilitating it. Mehedi, Mahbubul, Faruk and Nayan were directly involved in the crime.
On October 1, 2013, the International Crimes Tribunal-1 (ICT-1) sentenced BNP standing committee member Salauddin Quader Chowdhury to death after finding him guilty of committing crimes against humanity and genocide during the Liberation War in 1971.
On November 22, 2015, SQ Chowdhury was hanged for killing Nutan Chandra Singha and orchestrating three genocides. However, some parts of the draft verdict were found posted on the internet several hours before the verdict was pronounced. Later, showing the copy, Salauddin’s wife and son raised a complaint that the verdict had originated from the law ministry. On Oct 2, the tribunal registrar filed a general diary with Shahbagh police station over the leak. After primary investigation, the Detective Branch (DB) of the police filed a case under the Information and Communication Technology Act on October 4.
According to the lawyers, if found guilty, the accused may face up to 14 years of imprisonment or up to Tk. 1 crore in fines, or both, under the law.