পাতা:বাংলাদেশের স্বাধীনতা যুদ্ধ দলিলপত্র (প্রথম খণ্ড).pdf/৩২২

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বাংলাদেশের স্বাধীনতা যুদ্ধ দলিলপত্রঃ প্রথম খণ্ড
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remained at that particular place on the Fuller Road because when he saw the mob he thought it was quite impossible for him to get through. He actually heard the police open (ire and saw one-person shot through the head near the pumping station. On seeing this witness took to his heels and ran away along the Nazimuddin Road. This witness is one of the two non-official witnesses who speak to the actual firing. He said that he was behind the crowd 100 yards from the pumping station but it appears that this is not an accurate estimate and he probably meant that he was 100 ft. away from the station. But he was actually prevented from proceeding towards his destination, the Assembly, and as he said in answer to Question Nos. 74 and 75 he was afraid to pass by that way because he thought he risked his life if he did so. He added that he might be injured either by the police or by the mob; and it is his evidence that one person was shot through the head by the side of the pumping station on the road when the police opened fire Mr. Hamoodur Rahman relies on his statement as supporting the police witnesses estimate of the gravity of the situation at 3-00 p.m. at the Medical College gate. As an independent gentleman with no obligations to the police his word is valuable as supporting their assessment of the then position.

 44. The statements of the witnesses who came forward to condemn the police firing did not carry conviction. Many of them had no material contribution to make to the objects of the enquiry, and it was only to clear that the student elements were concerned to disclaim all knowledge of inconvenient facts and circumstances. Mr. Hamoodur Rahman points out that in the statements which they made in the enquiry they studiously avoided all mention of the events on the road outside the University and the Medical College gates and following the same pattern they spoke of events within the fencing - which was to them an area forbidden to the police-and they one and all knowledge of the microphone which was set up in the compound after the police firing was over-the microphone through which fiery speeches were broadcast over that particular area. Mr Ghani suggests that the students were “stampeded" and thought it was better in their own interest to disclaim all knowledge of anything that happened outside the compound and to confine to their statements to what had happened inside the gates. In answer to this explanation Mr. Hamoodur Rahman points out it inevitably follows that the statements cannot be relied upon and that if the students avoid mentioning any events in the streets and try to deny their presence as participants in the meeting on that day the statements which they do make should not be accepted as carrying any weight against the police. A witness who economises truth when it suits his personal ends stands discredited.

 45. Of all the statements that the general public made the most important one is that of Dewan Harun Md. Maniruddin (witness No. 64), the only witness who claims actually to have witnessed the firing. This witness stated that he was a student of the Jagannath College, Dacca, and admitted that he submitted two representations in response to the President's invitation. In his first statement he began by saying that he was a student of the Jagannath College, Dacca, who went to the University premises on the call of the All Party State Language Committee to raise a demand for Bengali as a State language at about 10-30 a.m. and the main aim of the assembled students was to let the M.L.A.'s and M.C.A.'s know their demand. So he himself in one statement admitted that he had gone to the University premises at the call of the All Party State Language Committee.