Syed Nazrul Islam, acting president of Bangladesh government in exile, Tajuddin Ahmed, prime minister, M Mansur Ali, finance minister, and AHM Qamaruzzaman, minister of home affairs, relief and rehabilitation, during the Liberation War were killed inside Dhaka Central Jail on November 3, 1975.

The killing seen as a desperate bid of power usurpers came 79 days after the assassination of Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and most of his family on August 15, 1975 that numbed the nation.

Judge Mohammad Motiur Rahman of the Metropolitan Sessions Judge's Court, Dhaka set up near Dhaka Central Jail, hands down the verdict at 10:30am amid beefed-up security.

About 400 undercover and uniformed policemen will remain on high alert guarding the court building, high-rises in the court area and roads in and out of Dhaka Central Jail.

Among the 23 accused, three are in custody, five on bail, 12 have been evading arrest and three died. Eleven convicts in the Bangabandhu Murder Case are among the accused.

In the first information report (FIR) filed with Lalbagh Police Station on November 4, 1975, Kazi Abdul Awal, deputy inspector general (prisons), accused Captain Moslemuddin and four army officers of the killings.

"One army officer wearing khaki uniform giving identity as captain Moslemuddin attached to Bangabhaban accompanied by four army personnel wearing khaki uniform came to the jail at 4:00am on November 3, 1975. They were armed with Stengun and SLR (self-loading rifle). They entered into the jail and killed four prisoners," the FIR reads.

The then officer-in-charge (OC) of Lalbagh Police Station ABM Fazlul Karim, tasked with investigation, visited the scene of killing where a magistrate made an inquest report of the bodies. Later, a postmortem report was prepared and the OC gathered evidence from the scene.

But the infamous Indemnity Ordinance blocked the investigation and trial for about 21 years until officers of the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) opened a probe on August 18, 1996.

Investigation Officer Abdul Kahar Akand, assistant superintendent of CID, arrested Lt Col (dismissed) Syed Faruqur Rahman, Lt Col (relieved) Sultan Shahriar Rashid Khan and retired major Khairuzzaman on September 9, 1996.

The IO also arrested Shah Moazzem Hossain, BNP lawmaker KM Obaidur Rahman and Nurul Islam Manzoor on September 29, 1996. Taheruddin Thakur, shown as an arrestee in the case on November 3, 1996, gave a confessional statement to an additional chief metropolitan magistrate.

The investigator sketched a map of the scene, recorded statements of witnesses and seized 53 items of evidence to press charges against 21 people, including Obaidur, on October 15, 1998.

Former president Khondakar Mushtaque Ahmed and former secretary Mahbubul Alam Chashi were dropped from the chargesheet, as they died before the probe started.

The chargesheet mentioned that Mushtaque and his associates pressed the four national leaders to join his cabinet after the killing of Bangabandhu.

On refusal, several army officers backed by Mushtaque picked up some Awami League (AL) leaders and activists including the four leaders on August 23, 1975 and sent them to Dhaka Central Jail, where the four were killed.

The court framed charges against Obaidur and 20 others on October 12, 2000 and began its trial on April 12, 2001.

Of the accused, Obaidur, Nurul Islam, Shah Moazzem Hossain, Taheruddin and retired army major Khairuzzaman got bail soon after the present government took office.

The government also reassigned Khairuzzaman to a foreign ministry job last year. Faruqur Rahman, Sultan Shahriar Rashid and Bazlul Huda are now in custody, as they are convicted of murdering Bangabandhu.

The accused on the run are retired resalder Moslehuddin, Lt Col (dismissed) Khondaker Abdur Rashid, Lt Col (relieved) Shariful Haq Dalim, Lt Col (Retd) SHMB Noor Chowdhury, Maj (retd) AKM Mohiuddin Ahmed, Lt Col (Retd) AM Rashed Chowdhury, Major (relieved) Ahmed Shariful Hossain, Capt (Retd) Abdul Majed, Captain (relieved) Kismat Hasem, Captain (relieved) Nazmul Hossain, Dafadar (dismissed) Marfat Ali Shah, Dafadar (dismissed) and Abdul Hasem. Lt Col (relieved) Abdul Aziz Pasha is believed to be dead.

The trial was complete in 278 workdays with the deposition of the complainant Kazi Abdul Awal.

Six judges who sat the case are Golam Rasul, Sheikh Rezwan Ali, AK Roy, Ahmed Jamil Mostafa, Molla Mostafa Kamal and Motiur Rahman.

JUSTICE DELAYED
The then officer-in-charge of Lalbagh Police Station ABM Fazlul Karim opened the probe as the investigation officer and Saifuddin Ahamad, deputy superintendent of police (DSP) of the CID at that time, took over the charge on November 21, 1975.

Saifuddin went to the place of occurrence, but the complainant declined to show him the scene.

The DSP was told that he could not visit the scene and record statements of witnesses without permission from the home ministry, as a three-member judicial probe committee headed by Justice Ahsan Uddin Chowdhury was constituted.

When he sought the permission in 1976, the home ministry said a judicial probe was on and it would inform him in time.

The trial could not be launched for the Indemnity Ordinance promulgated after the assassination of Bangabandhu.

CID senior assistant superintendents Abul Hossain, MG Mostafa, Fazlul Karim and Khalequzzaman were tasked with the probe later and they vainly wrote the home ministry on several occasions seeking permission to launch the probe until December 1994.

The home ministry in an order on August 17, 1996 gave the green light to the probe what the CID investigators opened the next day.

After taking office in 1996 after 21 years in the wilderness, the AL government of Sheikh Hasina repealed the Indemnity Ordinance on November 12, clearing legal obstructions to the trial.

The BNP-led four-party coalition government, after taking office in 2001, cancelled the appointments of four special public prosecutors who conducted the case under the AL, without explanations, on December 15, 2002.

But they were reinstated on December 3 the next year in the face of strong public protest.

The special prosecutors resigned on March 24 this year, saying there were 'unwarranted interference' in the case.

Advocate Anisul Haque, head of the special prosecutors, alleged when the witnesses were giving statements on January 18, defendant and BNP legislator Obaidur Rahman told him: "Who are you? You are in charge of what? I will take steps to remove you."

The government, the same day, assigned public prosecutor of the court Abdullah Mahmud Hassan to cooperate with the special prosecutors in running the case, triggering a 'festering discord' between the special prosecutors and the public prosecutor.

Mahmud Hassan was given the overall responsibility of running the case on March 21 that gave the special prosecutors an impression that the government did not want them to fight it.

The trial was halted for 10 months after Syeda Zohra Tajuddin, wife of slain prime minister and one of the high-profile victims of the jail killing Tajuddin Ahmed, filed a petition on January 26 last year seeking trial in the High Court.

In her petition, the AL presidium member said she feared she would not get fair justice in the lower court. The HC rejected the petition on August 25 the same year.

The arguments were complete on August 7 this year and the court on August 21 fixed September 7 for the delivery of the judgement.