The inspector general of police (IGP) has defended the questioning of ‘Jihad’s father Nasir Fakir but denied allegations that he was tortured in custody.
Hassan Mahmood Khandker says they interrogated Fakir in a ‘friendly manner’ to ‘crack the mystery’.
Fakir’s 4-year-old son ‘Jihad’ fell several hundred feet down an abandoned deep tubewell pipe at Dhaka’s Shahjahanpur on Friday afternoon.Fire Service officials failed to find him with a camera nearly 12 hours after the incident. State Minister for Home Asaduzzaman Khan Kamal doubted whether the boy indeed fell into the well.
Jihad’s father, along with two witnesses, was taken into police custody around 3am on Saturday. Fakir was released after his son’s body was pulled out of the hole at about 3 pm later in the day. The unannounced detention this lasted about 13 hours when the man was crying inside for his missing boy.
He said police suspected he had hidden his son and wanted to know the ‘truth’. They threatened Fakir saying he would be handed over to RAB if he did not speak.
IGP Khandker said, “He wasn’t tortured, rather he was amicably questioned.”
He was with State Minister Kamal after a law and order meeting and took questions from reporters that were directed at the state minister.
“Nasir [Fakir] was taken into custody with the honest intention to unravel the mystery.
“Anyone with the smallest bit of humanity could not have hurt him in such situation,” the IGP said.
But he added that they would look into allegations of torture.
State Minister Kamal quickly added, “He was not [detained] with ill intentions. It is regrettable if there was any incident of torture. ” – bdnews24.com
