Dhaka: Rokeya Khatun, mother of Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (BUET) student Abrar Fahad, has expressed satisfaction over the High Court order upholding the lower court verdict in her son Abrar Fahad murder case. “We are all satisfied that the previous verdict has been upheld. I express my gratitude to everyone. Even after six long years, the people of this country always stood beside us. For this, I express my gratitude to everyone. What we want now is for this verdict to be implemented quickly. If this verdict is implemented, no one will dare to commit such crime in future,” she told BSS at her residence following the HC verdict.
According to Bangladesh Sangbad Sangstha, Rokeya Khatun expressed sympathy to the parents of the convicted students, acknowledging the shared grief. “I know, like me, parents of the convicts are also saddened after hearing the HC verdict. No parents certainly sent their children to campus to be terrorists, but for pursuing education. But, the circumstances pushed them to come to this situation. And, for this we have nothing to do,” she said.
The mother of Abrar noted that there is no ragging now in educational institutions after the removal of the oppressive regime. “Students were not allowed to speak freely at that time. After mass upsurge in 2024, people can freely talk,” she observed.
The High Court upheld a lower court judgment convicting and sentencing 20 people to death and five more to life imprisonment in the case lodged over the killing of Abrar Fahad. A High Court division bench of Justice AKM Asaduzzaman and Justice Syed Enayet Hossain passed the verdict after hearing the convicts’ death references and jail appeals.
The High Court kept the judgment on CAV (court awaits verdict) on February 24, 2025, as the legal arguments concluded on that day. Abrar was brutally beaten to death on October 7, 2019, by some leaders of the then BUET unit Chhatra League over his posts on Facebook.
Abrar’s father filed the case with Chawkbazar thana against 19 students of BUET, and police later added six more names to the list of accused after investigation. Dhaka Speedy Trial Tribunal-1 convicted and sentenced 20 people to death and five more to life imprisonment on December 8, 2021.