AGARTALA: District and Sessions Court of West Tripura on Saturday convicted four accused including a police inspector in the sensational bank manager murder case in Agartala in August 2019 to rigorous life imprisonment.
After a long trial, the court found prime accused of the case - Sumit Chowdhury, Sumit Banik, Sukanta Biswas, and Omar Sharif guilty a day ago under sections 302 (murder) and 34 (common intention) of IPC and reserved the sentence , said special public prosecutor of the case Samrat Kar Bhowmik.
He said the victim bank manager, Bodhisatta Das and his friend were sitting in Ujjayanta palace area (Jackson Gate) of the city around 11.30PM, the convicted persons started urinating in public. When the victim, objected to the nuisance, a physical altercation broke out, ultimately resulting in his brutal murder.
During the trial, the court recorded the statements of 56 witnesses and two of them Basu Kar and Dr Abhijit Dasgupta turned hostile and retracted from their initial statements. The prosecution had prayed before the court to initiate perjury proceedings against them for giving false evidence, Kar Bhowmik added.
Out of the convicts, one of the accused Sumit Chowdhury is the son of a prominent jeweller, Sumit Banik, a renowned contractor, Sukanta Biswas a service police inspector and Soyeb Miah , a history sheeter with past criminal records.
Judgment questioned
However, the defence lawyer senior Aadvocate Pijush Kanti Biswas reacted sharply over the judgment and questioned knowledge of the judge, which created a fresh controversy.
Biswas said that in 45 years of profession, he did not experience such an "illegal", "bad" judgment.
"There was not a single witness stated against first three accused persons but the Judge convicted them, the newly inducted judicial officers even know, by that one cannot be sent to jail," Biswas stated.
He uttered, "After this order, I assume, the judge does not have basic knowledge of law. I am feeling ashamed."
