Freedom at last

Azaher Ali tasted freedom after 20 years.

It came eight years after the High Court acquitted him of murder charges and six years after a Supreme Court order that essentially paved the way for his release.

But the Dinajpur man continued to languish in prison all these years as the SC order did not reach the jail authorities until yesterday.

"It's really a joyful moment for me after 20 long years,” he told The Daily Star as he walked out of Dinajpur prison around 6:30pm yesterday.

Azaher, now 40, was arrested in a murder case in 1998, when he was just 20.

A Dinajpur court sentenced him to death in 2005. But in 2010, the High Court acquitted him of the murder. Two years later, the Supreme Court stayed the acquittal order, but asked the government to file a regular leave appeal. Or else, the HC order would stand valid.

It was not clear on which grounds the HC acquitted Azaher.

"Two weeks' time is granted to file the regular leave petition, failing which the criminal miscellaneous petition [stay petition] shall stand dismissed," said a seven-member bench of the SC, headed by the then chief justice Muzammel Hossain, on October 1, 2012.

The apex court order implied that Azaher would be able to walk free if the government failed to file the regular petition within that time.

But the government did not file the petition, and the SC authorities did not send the order to the prison authorities. 

All these years later, the matter came to light after the Dinajpur jail authorities communicated it to the Supreme Court Legal Aid Committee (SCLAC) recently.

The SCLAC looked into the case and requested the SC to send the order to Dinajpur jail.

The SC authorities sent a certified copy of the order to the jail authorities on Sunday.

Dinajpur District Jail Superintendent Sayeed Hossain said he got the SC order yesterday. "We then set him free."

Azaher would not have to be in jail all these years had the SC order reached the prison authorities immediately, he added.

Third among the seven siblings, Azaher used to run a small turmeric shop at Kishanbazar village in Dinajpur Sadar upazila, according to family members. 

He was arrested nearly two months after the murder of his father-in-law Abdul Jabbar in 1997.

Azaher's daughter was only 11 months old when he was arrested.

His wife left him after the arrest. But their daughter, Ajmira, was brought up by her grandmother. She was married off two years ago and is now a mother of a child. Azaher's father died in 2000.

His brother Moksedul Hossain came to know about the release after this correspondent called him.

Moksedul along with Azaher's daughter Azmira Khatun went to the jail to receive him.

Azaher went to his home at Panchbari village in Dinajpur sadar on his brother's motorcycle around 8:30pm.

"I am so happy to see my son. Now I can die in peace," his mother Monsura Khatun told The Daily Star by phone.