Blogger Rajib murder: Death for 2 confirmed

The High Court today confirmed death for two people and different terms in jail for six others for killing blogger Ahmed Rajib Haider.

READ more: Rajib’s father disappointed at HC verdict

The two death row convicts -- Redwanul Azad Rana, Faisal Bin Nayem alias Dweep -- were students of a private university.

Rana is also the main suspect in writer-blogger Avijit Roy killing case.

Blogger Rajib, who was an activist of Shahbagh movement and used to write against Jamaat-Shibir and war criminals on different blogs under the pseudonym Thaba Baba, was hacked to death near his Mirpur house in the capital on February 15, 2013.

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On December 31, 2015, a Dhaka court handed down death penalty to the duo while sentencing for different terms in jail to the six people including chief of banned militant outfit Ansarullah Bangla Team (ABT), for killing Rajib.

Among the jailed convicts, ABT chief Mufti Jasimuddin Rahmani, 45, was awarded to five years in jail as he was found guilty of provoking Rajib's murder through his sermons.

Five other convicts -- Maksudul Hasan alias Anik, Ehsan Reza Rumman, Nafis Imtiaz, Nayem Sikdar Irad and Sadman Yasir Mahmud -- were also students of a private university in 2013.

The convicts except Rana have filed separate appeals with the HC, challenging their sentences awarded by the trial court.

While passing the order the court said there is no scope to reduce the sentences of the convicts in this case as the Rajib killing incident is so horrendous.

The HC bench of Justice Jahangir Hossain and Justice Md. Jahangir Hossain came up with the verdict after hearing the death reference and appeals filed by the convicts.