HC upholds 139 BDR soldiers death penalty for 2009 carnage

The High Court today upheld death penalty for 139 paramilitary soldiers out of 152 for staging the barbaric 2009 carnage in the then Bangladesh Rifles (BDR) at their Pilkhaana headquarters in the heart of the capital.

"One thirty nine (rebel BDR solider) will have to walk to gallows and 146 will be imprisoned for life," attorney general Mahbubey Alam told a media briefing quoting the long verdict delivered by a three-judge High Court bench, according to a news agency.

The concerned trial court in its 2013 judgment originally sentenced 152 mutineers to death, one of them dying a natural death subsequently, while it handed down life term to 160.

Alam said the High Court commuted the death sentence of eight to life imprisonment and acquitted four of the charges.

The three-member High Court special bench concluded pronouncing the judgment at around 4.30 pm a day after it started pronouncing the the judgment.

The court also upheld life imprisonment for 146 out of the total 160 people, who were convicted by the third additional metropolitan sessions' judge's court on November 5, 2013.

The trial court had passed the judgment after examining 654 out of 1354 prosecution witnesses in the biggest criminal case in the history of the country.