A Chattogram tribunal on Monday sentenced eight people to death for killing a nine-year-old girl after rape in 2018.
Chattogram Women and Child Repression Prevention Tribunal-4 Judge Jamiul Haidar handed down the verdict.
The tribunal also fined the convicts Tk one lakh each.
The condemned convicts are- Belal Hossain alias Bijoy, Rabiul Islam alias Rubel, Hasibul Islam alias Liton, Aksan Mia alias Hasan, Mohammad Sujon, Meheraj alias Tutul, Manirul Islam Manu and Shahadat Hossain Soikat. Of them, Shahadat was tried in absentia.
According to the prosecution, the convicts picked up Meem, daughter of Jamal Uddin of Akbar Shah area, and took her to a building named Mamtaz Mahal in the area on January 21, 2018.
Later, they raped the girl and strangled her to death.
Local people spotted the body of Meem near the stairs of a six-storey building on the same day.
Police arrested seven people after victim’s mother Rabeya Begum filed a case with Akbar Shah Police Station.
In 2019, police submitted chargesheet against them.
During investigation, police came to know that the convicts killed the girl in a planned way centering an enmity with her mother.
Recent change to rape law
The government has recently cleared the way for delivering highest punishment awarding capital punishment in cases filed over rape.
The much-talked-about ‘Women and Children Repression Prevention (Amendment) Bill, 2020’ was passed in Parliament on November 17 for ensuring death penalty as the highest punishment for the heinous crime of rape.
The government came up with the move after the rape incident at MC college and another in Noakhali fuelled countrywide protests against sexual violence against women. UNB
