Felani's murder trial on the border, hanging in the Indian court for 14 years

Rafiqul Islam Rafiq, Kurigram Correspondent: My innocent teenage daughter was shot dead like a bird. She was just screaming in agony. They did not give her even a drop of water. They were hanging her body upside down on a barbed wire. The trial of this brutal murder that was public 14 years ago is still hanging in the Indian court. How long will we have to wait for the trial to be completed! This is the question that Felani's parents and locals are asking the new government.

On January 7, 2011, Bangladeshi teenager Felani Khatun was brutally killed by Indian Border Security Force (BSF) member Amiya Ghosh while she was crossing the barbed wire fence with her father at the Anantapur border in Phulbari upazila of Kurigram. Two years after the incident, the trial of this murder began in the BSF special court in Cooch Behar, India, on August 13, 2013. After the testimony of Felani's father and uncle, the accused BSF member Amiya Ghosh was acquitted on September 6. After the verdict was rejected and a retrial was demanded, he was acquitted for the second time. Later, the Indian Human Rights Protection Forum filed a writ petition in the country's Supreme Court on behalf of Felani's father. After that, the hearing date was postponed repeatedly. Although a new date was finally set on January 25, 2018, the trial process has mysteriously been suspended. Felani's parents and relatives blamed the previous government's negligence for not getting justice for her daughter's murder.

Felani's father Nurul Islam said, "Even though it has been 14 years since Felani's murder, we have not received justice yet. I went to the Indian Supreme Court, and despite being given a hearing date several times, it has been postponed. I want to see the trial of my daughter Felani's killer before I die."

Felani's mother Jahanara Begum said, "My only demand from the new government is that the trial should be held in an international court."

Plaintiff's lawyer S. M. Abraham Lincoln said, "If the petition that has been filed in the Indian Supreme Court, the writ that is there, is settled, it will not only be justice. I think in the future, including our border management, murders and corruption will decrease."

Rafiqul Islam Rafiq

Kurigram