Dhaka: Bangladesh Supreme Court is set to hear a government petition challenging the acquittal of several suspects in the 1975 assassination of four key independence leaders, as the country mourned their loss on the 37th anniversary of the carnage on Saturday.
"The case is now set for hearing before the Appellate Division (of the Supreme Court) as our (state side`s) concise statement was submitted two days ago as sought by the apex court," Attorney General Mahbube Alam told reporters.
He said the government is seeking to launch the appeal, challenging acquittal of several suspects of charges of the 1975 jail carnage in a 2008 High Court judgment.
The government will file its petition tomorrow, Alam said.
On the night of November 3, 1975, the four national leaders -- Syed Nazrul Islam, Tajuddin Ahmad, AHM Qamruzzaman and Captain Mansur Ali -- were brutally killed inside the Dhaka Central Jail by a group of army men.
Meanwhile, black flags dominated Bangladesh skyline and special prayers were offered paying tributes to the four leaders who steered the Liberation War in absence of `Bangabandhu` Sheikh Mujibur Rehman, who was in captivity in Pakistan at that time.
President Zillur Rahman, in a statement on the occasion, urged the people to turn their grief into strength while Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina said the "power usurpers", who wanted to make the country leaderless", had killed the four national leaders alongside Bangabandhu.
The assassination of the four leaders came three months after the killing of Bangabandhu along with most of his family members in a putsch on August 15, 1975 when his post- independence Awami League government was also toppled.
The four national leaders, who had been arrested as they declined to extend their support to the "illegitimate government", were killed inside the jail just ahead of a counter-coup that ousted the August 15 plotters.
In 2008, the High Court had acquitted four accused, who are still in hiding.
The apex court, however, had allowed government to file the appeal 22 months ago and simultaneously ordered immediate surrender of two absconding and earlier sacked non-commissioned army officers as prime suspects.
PTI
