Hang JMB kingpins

Disabled for life by JMB bomb ... (from left) cinema viewer Babu, Ajanta Cinema operator Fazal and employee Shaheen, Salimullah Babu, owner of Ajanta Cinema, who lost his right leg. PHOTO: Star File Photo

Twenty-one young people were killed and over 100 injured in serial bomb blasts in packed Ajanta, Chhayabant, Aloka and Purobi cinema halls on the day of Eid-ul-Fitr on December 7, 2002..

Twenty of the injured have become maimed and disabled for life. Abdur Rahman confessed to interrogators in Dhaka that cadres of Jamaatul Mujahideen, Bangladesh (JMB) blasted the bombs.

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Salimullah Babu, owner of Ajanta cinema, told this correspondent that the memory of the fateful event still hauntshim.

Babu lost his right leg in blast. Physically handicapped, he now passes days in great hardship.

"I was inside the Hall. It was hellish, unbelievable. There were blood and scattered bodies all around. I also felt pain in the leg but could not understand what had happened. I lost sense a few minutes later. When I regained sense, I found myself on hospital bed", he said.

Babu said he is very happy that Shaikh Abdur Rahman and Bangla Bhai have been arrested. "But victims like me will not get back normal life". Many others died or became crippled and their families have been destroyed.

Babu demanded capital punishment to the JMB kingpins and steps to root out such mindless violence from the country.

Nikhil Sarker, a shopkeeper, was one of those killed. His wife Mala Rani and daughter Nira Sarker said their family has been ruined following the killing of Nikhil, the only earning member of the family. Nira is a student of class six now. "I do not know how I will bear her education expenses", said Mala Rani. "They (JMB men) are killers. So they should be given capital punishment. They made us pauper".

"Every year, cinema blast tragedy day (on December 7) is observed and we attend the programme. That is all. We do not get any help to survive".

"JMB leader Abdur Rahman confessed to ordering the cinema blasts, so it is easy to try them under existing laws", added Mala Rani.

Sources said there has not been any headway in investigation into four blast cases. Immediately after the incidents, government arrested 31 leaders and activists of opposition Awami League (AL) including Saber Hossain Chowdhury and Mymensingh district AL president Motiur Rahman.