A case of enforced disappearance was filed on Wednesday against ousted Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and several others, including former ministers of her Cabinet, for allegedly kidnapping a lawyer in 2015.
This is the second case against 76-year-old Hasina after she resigned and fled to India on August 5 following massive protests against her and the Awami League-led government over a controversial job quota system.
Supreme Court lawyer Sohail Rana, a victim of enforced disappearance, has filed an application in the case, the Daily Star newspaper reported.
The court of Dhaka Metropolitan Magistrate Farzana Shakila Sumu Chowdhury ordered the charges to be accepted as a case.
Other accused in the case include senior ministers of the Hasina Cabinet, former Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan, former Law Minister Anisul Haque, former Inspector General of Police (IGP) Shahidul Haque, former Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) director general Benazir Ahmed and 25 unidentified RAB members.
“On February 10, 2015, I was detained from Sector 5, Uttara and forcibly put into a vehicle. As soon as I was inside the car, I was rendered almost unconscious by giving electric shocks in my ears and genitals,” the report quoted Rana as saying.
“After enduring various kinds of brutal torture over time, I was finally released in August in Godagri, Rajshahi,” he said.
On Tuesday, a murder case was registered against Hasina and six others in connection with the death of a grocery shop owner during violent clashes last month that led to the fall of her government.
More than 230 people were killed in Bangladesh in incidents of violence that broke out across the country following the fall of the Hasina government on August 5, taking the death toll to 560 since the anti-reservation protests began in mid-July.
An interim government was formed following the collapse of the Hasina-led government and its chief adviser, 84-year-old Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus, last week announced the portfolios of his 16-member advisory council.