My husband attacked ADC Harun sir first: ADC Sanjida
Sanjida Afrin, additional deputy commissioner (ADC) of Dhaka Metropolitan Police (DMP) and wife of President's APS Azizul Haque, said her husband attacked ADC Harun first during her medical checkup at the BIRDEM Hospital in Dhaka.
She disclosed the incident in an exclusive interview with Channel I, a private television channel, on Tuesday. According to ADC Sanjida, she sought help from her senior colleague, ADC Harun, while visiting a physician at the hospital on Saturday evening. Out of nowhere, her husband appeared in the scene along with some others and beat them up.
Sanjida also claimed that the companions of her husband were taking videos of them with ill motives. At one stage, ADC Harun informed the local police station, who later rescued them from the spot.
“My husband was totally out of his mind on the day,” she added.
Speaking about how the incident started, Sanjid Afrin said she has been ill for long and she sees a physician at Labaid Hospital regularly, but that physician was now out of the country. She then decided to consult a physician at BIRDEM Hospital. Since the hospital was in the Ramna area, she sought help from her colleague ADC Harun and the ADC made the appointment of a physician through Shabagh police station officer-in-charge (OC). Having arrived at the hospital, she learned that the physician was busy in a conference and would not see the patients. So, she informed ADC Harun about the matter.
Sanjida added, “I asked sir whether I could see any other physician. Sir was nearby. He said I am coming and let me see whether I can manage any other physician’s appointment. Sir came after a while. He talked to several physicians and later I saw a physician.”
She said the physician told her to take several tests, “I was undergoing an ETT (exercise tolerance test) during the incident. The ETT took 20-25 minutes. At the end of the ETT, I heard chaos outside the room. There was shouting. The first thing I heard was sir (ADC Harun) was saying out loud brother, why did you assault me? You cannot assault me.”
“At first, I thought there might be any quarrel with someone. But I saw my husband.Why he had come, what he had done, I knew nothing about it. He was totally out of his mind. There were several guys with him. I do not know them,” Sanjida said.
After that ADC Harun was beaten and taken to the ETT room, she said adding, “They were beating sir (ADC Harun) while taking him to the room. Sir went to a corner of the room in a bid to save himself. At that time, my husband, unfortunately, told those boys, make videos of these two.”
“I was in the ETT gown. You know what it looks like. It was disheveled. I was shouting at my husband that no man was supposed to enter this room. Why you enter the room with such many people? As I was shouting, he slapped me for two or three times.
“My driver rushed to us and stood between us, but my driver was overpowered and I was assaulted physically,” Sanjida said in the interview. She further said, “At one stage, I tried to take the mobile phone from one of the guys recording the video. I tussled with him. I by no means wanted to be videoed in that garb.”
Sanjida further said, “It seemed their intention was they want to make a video of the two of us standing next to each other so that they can use in later for with ill motives.”
ADC Harun was suspended following the matter of beating three leaders of Bangladesh Chattra League (BCL) after picking them up from BIRDEM Hospital to the police station. AC Sanjida has said nothing since the incident. She told Prothom Alo she went to BIRDEM Hospital for treatment.
One of the victims, Anower Hossain, organising secretary of the BCL central committee, told the journalists on Sunday they went to BIRDEM Hospital after the assistant personal secretary to the president and a senior brother from his area in Gazipur, Azizul Haque called them over mobile phone.
When asked about the statement of ADC Sanjida, another victim Sharif Ahmed, who is the BCL central science affairs secretary and DU’s Shahidullah Hall unit general secretary, told Prothom Alo on Monday evening he saw the interview of ADC Sanjida that he was very surprised.
“After we arrived, we saw it was a family affair. So we did not interfere further, let alone beat anyone. We made no video of anyone either,” Sharif Ahmed said.