Former Jubo League leader Ismail Hossain Chowdhury Samrat was implicated in cases due to personal and political vengeance, his family members claimed yesterday.

They, however, did not go into details. 

Saying that Samrat was very sick, they also demanded his immediate release for proper treatment.  

“My son is innocent. He is very sick. Please show mercy, release him and arrange better treatment for him,’’ his 80-year-old mother Sayera Khatun Chowdhury appealed to the prime minister in a feeble voice at a press conference in Dhaka Reporters Unity. 

On October 6, Rab arrested former Dhaka South Jubo League president Samrat, an alleged kingpin of illegal casino business, in Cumilla. 

Following a search at his Kakrail office later in the day, Rab at a press briefing said it seized from the office two devices used for torturing people, a pistol with five bullets, two kangaroo hides, 1,160 yaba tablets, and 19 bottles of foreign liquor. 

Later, a Rab mobile court sentenced Samrat to six months in jail for possessing wild animal hides and another six months for possessing the liquor. 

Two days later, he was admitted to a city hospital as he complained of chest pains. But he taken back to jail on Saturday.  

“Samrat is your man. He is like your son. As a mother, I am requesting you to forgive his faults and mistakes,” said Samrat’s sister Farhana Chowdhury while reading out a statement on behalf of her mother. 

“Samrat underwent an open-heart surgery in 1999. He is working for the party even though he has been ill since then,” she said, adding, “He is not an infiltrator.”  

The family gave a detailed account of Samrat’s involvement with the Awami League and his role in anti-autocracy movement and torments he endured “during the BNP regime in 1991.”  

“He is the ideal soldier of the Father of the Nation,” Samrat’s sister said.  

“Samrat had not been at his office for 10 days before his arrest. His office was unguarded. There was no liquor, yaba pills and pistol in the office. We suspect it is nothing but a part of a staged play,” she said.  

The family claimed that Rab did not get any drugs from where Samrat was arrested. He was taken to his Kakrail office in the capital where law enforcers searched his office for over four hours, but no journalist was allowed in the office during the search. 

“During the live telecast [from outside], they saw some law enforcers entering the office with bags on their backs. Those could not be noticed when they were coming out,” the sister said.  

The family refuted the allegations of his addiction to alcohol and involvement with any club where gambling was going on.  

In reply to questions about allegations against Samrat, his younger brother Russell Ahmed Chowdhury requested journalists not to ask any such question.  

He claimed that his brother did not amass any property illegally.