The long-awaited verdict over the Aug 21 grenade attack has drawn mixed reaction from ruling Awami League.
“We are not unhappy though the justice has been delayed. But we are not fully satisfied either as the mastermind did not get the capital punishment,’ General Secretary Obaidul Quader said on Wednesday.
“Tarique Rahman gave the order to carry out the operation, which Mufti Hannan confessed to the court.”
“The mastermind (Tarique) should have been given the death penalty,” said Quader, who is the road transport minister.
On Wednesday, a Dhaka court convicted the party’s acting chief Tarique Rahman in the 14-year-old incident. He has been given life in prison along with 18 others.
Former BNP ministers Lutfozzaman Babar and Abdus Salam Pintu are among the 19 people who have been awarded the death penalty.
Dhaka’s Speedy Trial Tribunal-1 judge Shahed Nuruddin convicted 49 people in the cases over the stunning 2004 assault that left 24 people dead and countless others scarred forever.
A total of 19 people have been sentenced to death and as many life imprisonments with 11 others sentenced to different terms of prison.