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Agony After Arbitration

Rape victim kills herself

Amanur Aman, Kushtia
Denied justice by the law, society and her own family, a rape victim in Kushtia killed herself early yesterday.
The thirty-year-old housewife from Hashimpur village in Kumarkhali upazila was raped allegedly by a quack on Sunday when she went to his chamber in the village bazaar to abort her 3-month old pregnancy, according to police.
Once in the chamber, quack Rafiquzzaman Jhantu injected her with a sedative for the abortion process but started raping her when she fell unconscious. But soon she regained consciousness and screamed for help. She was then rescued by people at the bazaar and sent home with assurances of justice, police said.
However, her cries for justice only met with obstacles and further insults.
The first blow came when she went to Kumarkhali Police Station the next day and police refused to take her case. Instead, they sent her to Abdul Hannan, general secretary of Jagannathpur union Awami Legaue, to seek justice.
According to locals, Jhantu has close ties with Hannan.
After the victim's husband Shahjahan met Hannan on that day, the latter arranged an arbitration on Tuesday where the rapist was fined Tk 50,000 for the crime.
"The victim, who was present at
the arbitration, instantly rejected the penalty and said she would take legal action against the rapist," Ratan Pramanik, a resident of the village told this correspondent.
However, her unfeeling rickshawpuller husband secretly took the money on Hannan's solicitation without the victim's knowledge. When she came to know this, she rebuked her husband and threatened to commit suicide if he did not return the money. But Shahjahan went into hiding once he had the money, said people who were present at the arbitration.
Her sufferings were yet far from being over. Back home, she was not even allowed to see her two sons since the rape incident. Her in-laws prevented her from coming close to her children.
Rahimon Khatun, the victim’s next door neighbour, described the last moments of her life.
"I heard the sounds of her relentless crying till about 2:30am on Wednesday. And then suddenly everything went quiet."
The victim's in-laws found her lifeless body hanging from the ceiling of her tin-shed room around 6:30am Wednesday morning.
Shahjahan's family then attempted to bury the body without informing others. However, some local journalists came to know about this and rushed to the spot around 2:30pm.
Later police arrived and sent the body to Kushtia General Hospital for an autopsy.
Police arrested the rapist Jhantu from his chamber yesterday afternoon while the victim's husband Shahjahan, local AL leader Hannan and others involved in the arbitration remain absconding.
Asked why police did not take her case when the victim came to them, Officer-in-Charge Sheikh Lutfor Rahman of Kumarkhali Police Station told The Daily Star that Hannan had asked him over the phone to send the victim to the AL leader, saying he would take care of the issue.
Contacted, Superintendent of Kushtia police Mofizuddin Ahmed said they would investigate the matter.
No local AL leaders were available to comment on Hannan's role in the lead up to the victim's suicide.