Several hundred agitated people barricaded Hatirjeel police station in the capital on Saturday evening and protested for hours after the body of a youth, arrested in a theft case, was found inside the lockup of the police station.
The victim, Sumon Sheikh, 25, was arrested in a theft case at his West Rampura house on Friday afternoon in a case filed by the sales office of Unilever Bangladesh Limited’s Pureit water purifier brand, said police.
Sumon’s family alleged that he was tortured and killed by the police after being bribed by the sales authorities of the water purifier brand.
Dhaka Metropolitan Police Tejgaon division deputy commissioner Azimul Haque ruled out the allegations and claimed that Sumon killed himself by hanging himself with his trouser from the rod of the ventilator of the lockup early Saturday.
He said that two policemen—Hatirjheel police sub-inspector Hemayet Hossain and constable Md Zakaria—who were in charge of guarding arrested people—were suspended after the incident and a three-member probe committee was formed.
Sumon hailed from Nawabganj, Dhaka, and worked at the office of the purifier brand as a labourer for six years. He left behind his wife and six-year-old son.
His wife, Jannat Akter, alleged that police raided their West Rampura house early Friday afternoon and arrested him in a theft case.
‘Sumon was taken to the purifier brand’s sales office after the arrest, and the police and the employers there tortured him. They asked for some stolen money, but Sumon said that he did not know anything about it. My husband was then tortured to death, but the police even did not inform us about the death until Saturday afternoon,’ said Jannat.
She complained that police took Tk 2 lakh as a bribe from the water purifier brand authorities and tortured her husband to death.
Sumon’s sister-in-law Shahnaj, who did not give her second name, said that her brother-in-law died at about 3:30am due to the police torture, but the police did not inform the family about it.
‘My mother went to Hatirjheel police station with breakfast for Sumon. The police did not inform us about the death and said that we could meet him at the court in the afternoon. We went to the court. Then police sent a picture of the dead body of Sumon to us around 3:00pm,’ said Shahnaj.
The body was sent to the Shaheed Suhrawardy Medical College morgue around 3:00pm Saturday, said the morgue source, adding that police documents showed it was a suicide case.
As the information about the death came to the fore, several hundred people, including the victim’s relatives, neighbours, and locals, started protesting in front of the police station and put up a barricade there seeking justice for the custodial death.
They alleged that police tortured Sumon to death and later staged it as a suicide incident.
The police assaulted some protestors and tried to push them off the road in front of the Hatirjheel police station.
DC Azimul said that Tk 53 lakh was stolen from the cashbox of the water purifier brand office on August 15 and a case was filed against unnamed people in connection with the theft.
During the investigation and CCTV footage analysis, police first arrested three staff members of the brand’s sales office. They are Al-Amin, Sohel Rana, and Anik Hossain.
With their information, police raided Sumon’s house and recovered Tk 3.13 lakh on Friday afternoon, said the police officer.
Police made a further raid, taking him with them, and then put him in the lockup around 11:00pm Friday.
Sumon was alone in the lockup and killed himself by hanging himself with his trouser from the rod of the ventilator at around 3:32am, claimed DC Azimul.
He said that the police station officer-in-charge informed him about the death in the morning.
The family said police at first wanted to show them CCTV footage of the incident but stopped when the family members were recording the footage.
‘Police grabbed my phone and deleted the recording,' said Sumon’s sister-in-law Shahnaj.
Azimul denied the allegations of the victim’s family and said that a three-member probe committee, led by DMP Tejgaon Industrial Zone additional deputy commissioner Hafiz Al Faruque, was asked to submit their report within seven working days.
No official of Unilever Bangladesh Limited or Pureit water purifier sales office was immediately available for comments.
Sumon’s death came within two days of another man from Taknaf, Siddique Ahmed, who died on Wednesday night at Dhaka Medical College Hospital while in the custody of the detective branch of Dhaka Metropolitan Police.
Rights group Ain o Salish Kendra, in their statement on Tuesday, said that nine people died in the custody of law enforcement agencies in the first seven months of the year.
Earlier, 21 died in police custody in 2020, 18 each in 2018 and 2019, and seven in 2020.
At a press conference in Dhaka on Wednesday, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet, said that she raised her deep concern about serious allegations, including torture and extrajudicial killings, during her four-day visit to Bangladesh.
