A bench of the high court in Bangladesh has acquitted former minister Lutfozzaman Babar and five others in the 2004 Chittagong arms seizure case. According to Prothom Alo, the death sentence of Paresh Barua, the head of the banned militant group Ulfa, has been commuted to life imprisonment. This case involved 10 truckloads of weapons and ammunition meant for terrorist groups operating against India.
This substantial consignment of weapons was confiscated in 2004 during the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) and Jamaat-e-Islami regime. Evidence had surfaced implicating then-state home minister Lutfozzaman Babar in the smuggling of arms meant for anti-Indian forces.
Whose Sentence Changed?
Babar served as the state home minister from 2001 to 2006 under Khaleda Zia's BNP government. The regime had also provided sanctuary to Ulfa's Paresh Barua in Bangladesh.
According to Dhaka's Prothom Alo, Barua is among the six convicts who have been relieved from the death sentence. His sentence has been reduced to life imprisonment, while others have received 10-year terms.
Read more: How serious is Priyanka Gandhi's sympathy towards Hindus being targeted in Bangladesh? | Opinion
Transformation Post-Hasina
The Awami League government under Sheikh Hasina had clamped down on anti-Indian forces in Bangladesh. The acquittal of Babar and the reduction of Barua's death sentence come at a time when the caretaker government, led by Muhammad Yunus after Hasina, has taken charge in Dhaka. The new government in Dhaka has not been notably amicable towards India, particularly amid violence against minorities, including Hindus, which New Delhi has criticized.
