Two friends used to work as day labourers together at various places in Khulna city and they were almost always together.
They were rarely seen apart.
Suddenly, one day both of them disappeared. The family thought they might have gone somewhere for work. However, even though one friend returned after three days, there was no trace of the other.
This was when the drama began. Hasib Mridha's mother, Sweety Begum, rushed to her son's close friend, Md Sohel.
Sohel informed her that the two of them had gone to Dhaka from Khulna three days ago to work as day labourers. While he had returned, Hasib had not.
Desperate to find their son, Hasib's parents, Sweety Begum and Hasan Mridha, asked where their son was left.
Sohel then said that on 21 September of the previous year, he left Hasib at Ramna Batamul in Dhaka and returned to the area.
Hasib's parents wanted to go to Dhaka to look for their son. On 25 September, Sohel himself took them to Dhaka by train. They searched the areas surrounding Ramna Batamul, Matsya Bhaban, Shahbagh, and Gulistan's Golap Shah Mazar in the capital.
Despite hours of searching, they found no trace. Eventually, Hasib's parents returned to Khulna disappointed. But no one realised at the time that the friend who stood by them in their search was actually the killer.
An unidentified body
On 23 September of the previous year, the Rupsha river police outpost recovered an unidentified male body found floating near the eastern side of the large pontoon in the Shipyard area of Khulna's Labanchara police station.
The body was decomposed, making immediate identification impossible. The police filed an unexplained death case regarding the incident. Later, the body was buried as unclaimed.
A team from the Police Bureau of Investigation (PBI) Khulna District Police was conducting a shadow investigation into the case. They were checking with various police stations in neighbouring districts to see if there were any missing person reports filed before or after 23 September.
PBI investigation-related individuals found that there was indeed such a report in the Labanchara police station. Following this lead, they got in touch with Hasib's mother, Sweety Begum. On 29 September, Sweety Begum was shown a still image of the recovered body. She identified the body as her son Hasib, based on a tattoo on the right arm, clothing, and physical structure.
The friend was the killer
The moment the body was identified, suspicion turned towards Hasib's friend Sohel. Initially, Sohel did not confess. After preliminary questioning, PBI kept him under surveillance. During this period, Sohel was arrested in a theft case and sent to jail.
Meanwhile, on 18 November, Hasib's mother, Sweety Begum, filed a murder case against Sohel at Khulna Sadar Police Station. On 25 November, Sohel was remanded in custody and questioned in connection with the murder case. On 27 November, he confessed to the murder in a statement given to the court.
The investigating officer of this case, PBI Khulna District Sub-Inspector (SI) Rezwan Ahmed, told Prothom Alo that considering the surrounding circumstances, it is quite certain that Sohel murdered Hasib. The technical investigation suggested the same. Sohel was remanded and questioned in the Hasib murder case afterward.
Murder Over an Argument About Drugs
During PBI's interrogation, Sohel mentioned that on the evening of 21 September, he took Hasib Mridha from Helatala Mor in Khulna Sadar area by auto-rickshaw to the bank of the Rupsha River.
There, a quarrel broke out among them over the use of glue (Dandy)-type intoxicants. At one point, Sohel punched Hasib on the chest. Hasib lost consciousness. Thinking Hasib was dead, Sohel disposed of the body in the Rupsha river to conceal it.
He then returned to the area and began the act of searching for his missing friend.
Khulna District PBI Superintendent of Police Reshma Sharmin told Prothom Alo that initially, the case of the recovered decomposed body was without clues.
Once the body was identified, technical investigations pointed to a suspect. The person involved in the incident has already given a statement in court admitting guilt. The charge sheet for this murder case will be submitted soon.