The Dhaka District and Sessions Judge’s Court on Monday charged Rana Plaza owner Sohel Rana and 40 others with murder of 1,137 people in the collapse of the nine-storey building, which housed five apparel factories, at Savar on April 24, 2013. The judge of the court SM Kuddus Zaman also posted for September 18 the commencement of the formal trial in the case with the recording of testimonies of the complainant. Wave of shock mounted across the world after the nine-storey Rana Plaza, which had housed five apparel factories, a shopping mall and a bank, collapsed on 24, 2013, leaving 1,137 people, mostly female apparel workers, killed and scores injured and maimed. Several dozen workers are still missing. Rana Plaza owner Sohel Rana, his parents, Abdul Kahleque and Marzina Begum, New Wave Bottoms and New Wave Styles chairman Bazlus Samad Adnan, New Wave Bottoms managing director Mahmudur Rahman Taposh, Phantom TAC and Phantom Apparels official Aminul Islam and Ethertex chairman Anisur Rahman and its managing director Jannatul Ferdous were among the 38 accused charged with murder and the rest three were charged with helping some of the accused in fleeing, district public prosecutor Khondaker Abdul Mannan told New Age. Sohel Rana, a local leader of ruling Awami League’s youth wing Awami Juba League, and 33 other accused, were in the dock and pleaded not guilty as the judge read out the charges, said the prosecutor. Of the accused, Sohel Rana and six others are behind the bars, 27 are on bail and the rest seven are still in hiding, the prosecutor said. The court also rejected petitions filed by Sohel Rana and 22 other accused seeking to be discharged, he said. The prosecutor opposed the petitions, saying that the accused had forced workers to do work at the apparel factories although cracks were found in some columns of the illegal building the day before its collapse. The indicted people include the then Savar upazila nirbahi officer Kabir Hossain Sardar, then Savar municipal mayor Refayetullah, councillor Muhammad Ali Khan, and the municipality’s then chief executive officer Uttam Kumar Roy, Rajdhani Unnayan Kartripakkha building inspector Awlad Hossain, then joint labour director Jamshedur Rahman, then deputy chief factory inspector Belayet Hossain, inspectors (engineering) Yusuf Ali and Shahidul Islam. Earlier, in another case, Sohel Rana and 17 others were charged with violation of the building code in constructing Rana Plaza. The court had also posted for August 23 the commencement of formal trial in the case. Sohel Rana and 16 others charged in the building code violation case were also charged with murder in the murder case. After the disaster, Savar police station sub inspector Wali Ashraf filed a case against Sohel Rana, and the owners of the five apparel factories under the Penal Code. Rajuk filed another case against the Savar municipality under the Building Construction Act 1952 for the construction of the Bangladesh National Building Code. In addition, brother of killed female apparel worker filed a murder case with the Dhaka Chief Judicial Magistrate’s Court. The court, however, asked the Criminal Investigation Department to investigate the murder case together with the one filed by the police. On June 1, 2015, two years and one month after the incident, senior assistant superintendent Bijoy Krishna Kar submitted a 45-page charge sheet with 3,362 pages of related documents in the murder case while a 16-page charge sheet in the building code violation case. The investigator had blamed bureaucratic tangle for the delay in submitting the charge sheet. The CID officials had said that the investigators had sought permission from the respective government offices to name 13 officials, including the then Savar upazila nirbahi officer, Kabir Hossain Sardar, in the charges. Public administration ministry’s senior assistant secretary Shahnaz Yesmin Lilly in a letter on December 23, 2014 informed the CID that they would not give permission to press charge against the then Savar UNO, Kabir Hossain Sardar, while RAJUK in a separate letter on December 11, 2014 refused permission for action against its building inspector Awlad Hossain. The labour ministry also refused permission for pressing charges against four of it officials –Jamshedur, Belayet, Yusuf Ali and Shahidul Islam. The government, eventually, gave permission for action against seven, including Refayetullah, Muhammad Ali Khan and Uttam Kumar Roy. The investigators, however, included the Rajuk and labour ministry officials in the charge sheet, leaving their final inclusion to the court’s discretion. Some 594 people were named as prosecution witnesses. Lawyers said that trial of the two cases might be lingered as 594 people were named witnesses in the murder case while 135 others in the other case.
