The High Court (HC), on Monday, removed Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) from the investigation into the murder of the journalist couple Sagar Sarowar and Meherun Runi in 2012, and also directed the Ministry of Home Affairs to form a high-powered taskforce to probe into the case.
The taskforce has been ordered to submit the investigation report to the HC in six months. The court also fixed 6 April 2025, for holding hearing on the matter.
The HC bench of Justice Farah Mahbub and Justice Muhammad Mahbub Ul Islam passed the order after hearing on an application, filed by the government, seeking its order on the authorities concerned to remove RAB from the investigation into the murder case.
Not completing the investigation into the murder case was shocking, not only for the family of the victims but also for the nation as a whole, according to an observation by the HC bench during the hearing.
Lawyer Mohammad Shishir Manir, who appeared in the court hearing on behalf of the complainant, said representatives of Police Bureau of Investigation (PBI) and Criminal Investigation Department (CID) may be a part of the taskforce.
Sagar Sarowar, news editor of private TV station Maasranga, and his wife Meherun Runi, senior reporter of another channel ATN Bangla, had been killed at their rented flat in the capital's West Rajabazar on 11 February 2012.
Following the murder, Sher-e-Bangla Nagar Police had started an investigation into the case, filed in this connection.
Later, the case was shifted to Detective Branch (DB) of police. However, on 18 April 2012, the HC, in an order, shifted the case to RAB for investigation, as the DB had expressed its inability to resolve the case.
On September 9 this year, a Dhaka Court asked RAB to submit the probe report of the case filed over the murders by October 15. This is the 113th extension of the deadline for probe report submission.
Earlier, two separate courts expressed dissatisfaction over the probe and the investigators' failure to unearth the motive behind the murders and arrest the real culprits.
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