Daijiworld Media Network

Dhaka, Nov 6: As many as 152 former members of a paramilitary border security unit called the Bangladesh Rifles were sentenced to death row on Tuesday for their involvement in the 2009 mutiny which killed 74 people while demanding for better working conditions. Judge Akhtaruzzaman said that those who were killed were not even afforded the respectful burial that they deserved.

Furthermore the mutiny is believed to have started all of a sudden at an annual conference where the guards took their commanding officers - of the Bangladesh Army as hostages and then demanded increments in their pay and changes in the dynamics of command and control among others.

Broken down after 33 hours of its rising, the mutiny saw many of its officers flee the scene. The police later found the dead bodies in a ditch used as a mass burial ground. 57 of these were top and mid ranking officers of the Bangladesh Army.

Of the many more that were brought to trial about 250 were sentenced to 20 odd years of imprisonment. Some more were sentenced to life imprisonment. The sentencing comes as a shock considering the large number of people to face capital punishment in Bangladesh - a country hitherto known for almost never meting out such a verdict. Add to it the fact that this has come about in a single court case.