The Appellate Division of the Supreme Court on Thursday adjourned until May 26 the hearing of a state petition seeking permission to appeal against a High Court verdict that had acquitted BNP acting chairman Tarique Rahman and 48 others in two cases in connection with the August 21, 2004 grenade attack on an Awami League rally in Dhaka.
A four-member bench,聽 led by chief justice Syed Refaat Ahmed, deferred the hearing as state counsels Aneek R Haque and Abdul Zabbar Bhuiyan sought time to place additional grounds in support of reinstating the trial court鈥檚 verdict.
The High Court had overturned the trial court鈥檚 judgment, citing procedural flaws as the supplementary charge sheet was accepted by a sessions judge instead of a judicial magistrate in violation of the Code of Criminal Procedure.
During Thursday鈥檚 proceedings, additional attorney general Abdur Zabbar Khan argued that the trial court did not commit any illegality in taking cognisance of the charges against the additional accused during the Awami League regime.
The apex court accepted the state鈥檚 request for time to submit further grounds and adjourned the matter accordingly.
On December 1, 2024, a High Court bench comprising Justice AKM Asaduzzaman, who was later promoted to the Appellate Division, and Justice Syed Enayet Hossain overturned the October 2018 trial court verdict, declaring it illegal on grounds of multiple procedural and legal inconsistencies.
The Dhaka Speedy Trial Tribunal-1 on October 10, 2018 sentenced 19 people, including Lutfozzaman Babar, to death, Tarique and 18 others to life term imprisonment, and 11 more to varying prison terms in connection with the grenade attack.
Tarique Rahman, elder of Bangladesh Nationalist Party chairperson Khaleda Zia鈥檚 two sons, was tried in absentia as he has been living in London since 2008.
The grenade attack carried out on August 21, 2004 targeted an Awami League rally on Bangabandhu Avenue in the capital, killing 24 people, including senior AL leader Ivy Rahman, wife of late president Zillur Rahman.
Then opposition leader Sheikh Hasina, who was the prime minister during the verdict of sentencing 49 individuals in 2018, narrowly escaped the attack but sustained hearing damage.
Two cases鈥攐ne for murder and the other under the Explosive Substances Act鈥攚ere filed the following day of the attack against unidentified assailants.
