Salman F Rahman, private industry affairs adviser to former prime minister Sheikh Hasina, and Anisul Huq, former law minister, were arrested in the capital’s Sadarghat yesterday.
They were arrested in a case filed with New Market Police Station over the killing of a Dhaka College student, according to police sources.
The duo were trying to flee using the waterway, Dhaka Metropolitan Police Commissioner Mainul Hasan told The Daily Star.
Coast guards detained them in Narayanganj’s Pagla area and handed them to police, said the media wing of Bangladesh Coast Guard last night.
Police did not say where Salman and Anisul were headed for.
The duo were arrested on the charges of instigating the killing of Dhaka College student Sabuj Ali, 26, on July 16, said sources.
Sabuj’s elder brother Nurnabi filed the case on July 17, accusing unnamed people after he identified Sabuj’s body at Dhaka Medical College morgue.
According to the first information report (FIR), Nurnabi learned around 3:00pm on July 17 that his brother Sabuj was admitted to Dhaka Medical College Hospital with serious injuries.
Nurnabi then went to the hospital and found Sabuj’s body.
The FIR mentioned that Sabuj’s classmates told Nurnabi that BNP-Jamaat activists had beaten up Sabuj near Dhaka College around 4:15pm on July 16.
The students demanding reforms to quotas in government jobs were joined by BNP-Jamaat men carrying sticks and iron rods near the Science Lab and were setting fire to different establishments, said the FIR.
The BNP-Jamaat men beat him up near the Globe Shopping Centre, leaving him seriously wounded.
Passersby took Sabuj to the DMCH where doctors pronounced him dead around 5:15pm, the FIR added.
Over 550 people, including students and police personnel, were killed in violence during the student protests that turned into a mass uprising which toppled the Sheikh Hasina-led government last week.
Salman was a lawmaker from Dohar and vice-chairman of the Beximco Group. He is also the chairman of IFIC Bank and holds key positions in many business associations.
He was considered as one of the influential figures among the policymakers in the Awami League government.
Anisul, a reputed lawyer, was the law minister for three consecutive terms after 2014.
Before that, he was the chief counsel and special prosecutor for the Anti-Corruption Commission, and the chief prosecutor for the Pilkhana carnage case.
His father Serajul Huq was a prominent organiser of the Liberation War in 1971. Anisul was the chief special prosecutor for both the Bangabandhu Murder Case and the Jail Killing case.
He was one of the few cabinet members of the immediate past government who tried to diffuse the student protests for quota reform.
