Prothom Alo journalist Samsuzzaman taken to court 30 hrs after being picked up

After 30 hours of being picked up from his residence, Prothom Alo’s staff correspondent in Savar, Samsuzzaman, was produced before the court on Thursday, shown to be arrested in a case filed at Ramna police station in the capital.

Samsuzzaman was produced before the court of Chief Metropolitan Magistrate, Dhaka, at around 10:30 am, his lawyer Prashanta Karmaker told Prothom Alo.

A case was filed against Samsuzzaman under the Digital Security Act (DSA) with Ramna police station after more than 20 hours of picking up from his residence near Jahangirnagar University.

A team of 15-16 plainclothesmen, who identified themselves as members of police’s Criminal Investigation Department (CID) picked up the Prothom Alo staff correspondent at around 4:00 am on Wednesday. Prothom Alo editor Matiur Rahman is the main accused in the case.

Samsuzzaman was produced before the court in this case.

One of the plainclothesmen searched Samsuzzaman’s room and seized his laptop, two mobile phones and portable hard disk. Later, the men took Samsuzzaman with them to unknown place.

So far two cases have been filed under the Digital Security Act in this connection. The first one is with Tejgaon police station and the second case with Ramna police station.

On 26 March, a ‘card’ was prepared with a photograph and a quotation of a day labourer Zakir Hossain for sharing a news report of Prothom Alo Online on Facebook. Though the card mentioned the name of day labourer Zakir Hossain below the quotation, the photograph of a child was mistakenly used there.

The discrepancy was noticed 17 minutes after publishing the Facebook post and it was removed immediately.

Besides, the report was republished with necessary corrections and a note below the report regarding the corrections. Nowhere in the report it was said that the quotation is of the child; rather it was clearly stated that the quotation is of day labourer Zakir Hossain.

Following this report, a certain Syed Md Golam Kibria filed the first lawsuit against Samsuzzaman under Digital Security Act.

The case was filed at 2:15 am on Wednesday, said the case statement. Identifying the plaintiff, it was written he lived in Kalyanpur, Dhaka.

According to Golam Kibria’s Facebook profile, he is the general secretary of ward no. 11 of Dhaka city north unit Jubo League, the youth wing of ruling Awami League. Earlier, he was a member of the central committee of Bangladesh Chhatra League, the student wing of the ruling party.