A special tribunal in Satkhira on Tuesday sentenced 48 leaders and activists of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party and its front organisations, including BNP’s central leader and former lawmaker Habibul Islam Habib, to various jail terms in two cases for attacking the motorcade of Awami League president and the then opposition leader Sheikh Hasina in 2002.

Of the convicts, four including ex-BNP MP Habibul were jailed for life and the remaining 44 others were sentenced to suffer for seven years in jail.

Judge Bishwanath Mandal of Satkhira Special Tribunal-3 pronounced the verdict in two cases under arms and explosive substances act, said additional public prosecutor Faimul Huq.

A total of 35 accused including Habibul heard the verdict from the dock.

Besides Habibul, the life term punishment recipients are the then Kalaroa upazila Juba Dal president Quader Bachchu, the then Kalaroa municipality unit Juba Dal president Arifur Rahman and the then Chhatra Dal leader Md Ripon.

Faimul Huq said that all the convicts present in the dock were sent to jail.

On February 4, 2021, the Satkhira Chief Judicial Magistrate Court sentenced 50 leaders and activists of the BNP and its front organisations, including Habibul, to various jail terms in another case for attacking the motorcade of Sheikh Hasina in 2002.

Sheikh Hasina’s motorcade came under attack in front of the Kalaroa upazila parishad complex on August 30 at about 10:30am, 2002, while she was on her way to Jashore from Satkhira after visiting a rape victim.

Though Sheikh Hasina escaped unhurt, many AL leaders, including the then district AL president engineer Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, were injured and several vehicles of the motorcade were vandalised.