A superintendent of police has been accused of rape by a colleague who has petitioned a court to file a case against him.
The superintendent is accused of ‘raping’ the accuser several times during a UN peacekeeping mission in Sudan’s Darfur in 2019 and again at a hotel in Dhaka’s Uttara once the two were back in Bangladesh.
Dhaka Women and Children Repression Prevention Tribunal Judge Mosammat Kamrun Nahar heard the statement of the accuser for nearly one and a half hours on Thursday. The judge kept the decision pending.
“A petition has been made to start a case,” said Md Jafar Hossain, deputy commissioner of the Dhaka Metropolitan Police Crime, Information and Prosecution Division. “The court will deliver its decision later.”
The accuser currently holds the position of inspector, said public prosecutor Afroza Farhana. The officer who faces rape accusations is Superintendent Moktar Hossain, who is currently assigned to the Bagerhat offices of the Police Bureau of Investigation.
Several attempts were made to contact Moktar Hossain by phone, but he did not take the calls.
“I will inquire about the matter and inform you later,” said Md Sohel Rana, a spokesperson for the police headquarters. He could not be reached afterwards.
“If a case is filed, it will be investigated accordingly,” PBI Chief Banaj Kumar Majumder told bdnews24.com. “Everything will be revealed in the probe.”
“The accuser did not bring the allegation to the PBI before seeking a case,” he said.
According to the petition, Hossain joined the UN peacekeeping mission in Sudan’s Darfur in 2019. The accuser had already been assigned there at the time.
The accuser said that, as she had been assigned there for some time, Hossain would contact her under the ruse of ‘seeking her help’ with something and make excuses to go to her house.
Hossain, her senior colleague, then ‘raped her’ on Dec 20, 2019. The accuser also described the incident in her complaint.
Moktar then ‘threatened her’ not to tell anyone and left, she said. Then, on Dec 22, he went to her house, saying that he had made a mistake and asked for her forgiveness before ‘raping her’ again.
The petition said Hossain promised to marry her and then, when the two were back home on holiday, lured her to a hotel in Dhaka’s Uttara with promises of marriage on Feb 9, 2020 and ‘raped’ her again.
The woman said she was then ‘raped’ again at a hotel in Sudan’s Khartoum between Jun 26 and Jun 30, 2020 and again between Nov 10 and Nov 13 at a hotel in Dhaka’s Uttara.
Once the two returned to Bangladesh, she urged Hossain to register their marriage, and he showed his reluctance to follow through. On Apr 12, 2021, she went to his house in Rajarbagh to push him to register the marriage and he denied her.
The accused’s wife and family were at home, became agitated and ‘beat her’, the accuser alleged.
The accuser said that her petition to file a case was delayed by the pandemic.
