The murder of Sagar Sarowar and Meherun Runi (also known as the Sagar-Runi murder case) is about the unsolved double murder case of two well-known, married Bangladeshi journalists who were stabbed to death in 2012. The case is still open.
Rumors have been circulating for a long time that the Awami League and India were involved in the BDR murders because they had secret information about them.
The couple's murder received high-level political attention and widespread media coverage in Bangladesh, and attracted German interest, as Sarowar had lived in Germany and had worked as a journalist for Deutsche Welle. The case was also closely watched by journalists and international press freedom organisations. The couple's murder also unified organisations representing Bangladeshi journalists that had once been separate.
A representative of the family said, "In the past 25 years, this has been the most talked/written about, prioritized case in Bangladesh." A demonstration was called in 2017 for the fifth anniversary of the murder in order to call for the release of the investigation report.
Biographical and career information
Golam Mustofa Sarowar was better known as Sagar Sarowar. His family is from old Dhaka. He was a broadcast news editor for Maasranga Television since December 2011. He had previously worked for Deutsche Welle's Bangla service for three years as part of the German broadcaster's South Asia department in Bonn, Germany. Before Deutsche Welle, he worked in print as a columnist and a reporter for Ittefaq (ca. 1997), Jugantor, and Sangbad. He was known as an energy reporter, and his work also appeared in the trade magazine Platts Oilgram News. He was a founder and leader of the Forum for Energy Reporters Bangladesh (FERB) and an editor-in-chief for the online magazine Energy Bangla. Sarowar was a director on the nine-member board of FERB, which created a network of energy reporters across the subcontinent. In addition, Sarowar was known as a blogger, and he also wrote for the OhMyNews citizen journalism website for a brief time (c. 2006–2007).
Meherun Nahar Runi was a senior television reporter for ATN Bangla, where she had been working at least since 2001. Before that she worked in broadcast media for Channel i and in print media for Sangbad and Jugantor. She also frequently reported on energy issues in Bangladesh. She was also known as a crime reporter.
The couple had one son, who was five years old at the time of their murder.
They were buried in the Azimpur graveyard in Old Dhaka. It is a well-known burial ground used by Muslim residents of Dhaka.
Death The married Bangladeshi couple, Sagar and Runi, lived with their five-year-old child on the fourth floor of a five-story building in the West Raja Bazar neighbourhood (mahallah) of Dhaka. Neighbors say that Sarowar and Runi had more than one person in the apartment as guests before they were killed.
Sarowar didn't leave his office at Maasranga until about 1:30 a.m. on the morning of 11 February 2012. From information gathered from a security guard, police believe the couple was killed some time after Sarowar arrived home and before the dawn Fajr prayer, which occurs before sunrise. According to sources, this would place the murder event sometime between 2 and 5 in the morning. Each victim died of multiple stabbing wounds, and sources said Sarowar's limbs were tied and he had the most stab wounds. Their son woke up at around 7 a.m. and discovered his parents dead in a pool of blood and called Runi's mother sometime around 7:30 a.m. by cell phone. The site became an active crime scene around 11 a.m.
The crime scene showed evidence that it had been searched, and the couple's possessions were strewn around the apartment. A kitchen window grill was cut and had an opening of approximately 1.8 feet, which Imam Hossain, deputy commissioner with the Tejgaon police, said would be too small for an adult to pass through.
Investigations
Initial investigation Investigators from two different main law enforcement agencies arrived at the crime scene around 11 a.m. on 11 February. The investigation fell under the jurisdiction of Bangladesh Police from Tejgaon Thana, a subdistrict of the Dhaka District, but was also being investigated by the intelligence branch of the Rapid Action Battalion. The RAB was founded in 2004 as a paramilitary arm of the police. Since the couple was well known, the crime scene attracted the attention of those in the upper echelon of Dhaka's law enforcement, as well as politicians. Among the law enforcement officials at the couple's apartment were Hassan Mahmood Khandker, who is the inspector general of the Bangladesh Police, and Benajir Ahmed, commissioner of the Dhaka Metropolitan Police. The Dhaka Courier reported that 14 teams were sent to the crime scene. Days after the investigation began, journalists from the Crime Reporters Association of Bangladesh reported that the two organisations were working independently from one another.
A number of politicians and other high-placed individuals visited the crime scene. Home Minister Sahara Khatun ordered the Bangladesh Police to arrest the murderers of Sagar and Runi within 48 hours. Later, the police told the family that the traffic through the residence had damaged evidence. The traffic through the crime scene could have also contaminated the DNA samples that were later discovered in the labs. Another Home Minister—Muhiuddin Khan Alamgir, who was appointed in September 2012—said after a year had passed, "Journalists and common people destroyed all the important evidences from the spot before police could reach there."
One of the two security guards was initially detained but was released shortly thereafter, and then he disappeared until his arrest almost one year after the case began.
The autopsies in the case were conducted at Dhaka Medical College. The autopsy revealed that possibly three knives were used during the murder. No viscera test was conducted during the autopsy, which was later criticised. The bodies were later exhumed for further testing.
Nowsher Alam Roman, who is Runi's brother, represented both families, and he officially filed the couple's murder case with the police over a day after the murder was discovered. Officer Rabiul Alam was assigned to be the lead detective in the case and headed the investigation for the next two months.
Second investigation After two months and the passing of deadlines issued by the Home Minister, justices ruled on a petition by Human Rights and Peace for Bangladesh and said the case had become stalled. The similarities between the stalled investigation in the Sagar-Runi murder case and another high-profile murder of a Saudi Arabian diplomat, Khalaf Al-Ali, on 6 March, along with the political pressure exerted in both cases on investigators, prompted Professor M. Shahiduzzaman from the University of Dhaka to call the latter case "a sequel". By order of the High Court in Bangladesh on 18 April 2012, the Sagar-Runi murder case was reassigned from the Detective Branch to the RAB, both of which are under the Bangladesh Police. The court called for the new investigators to use advanced criminal investigation technologies. And the court also established a monitoring committee that was to be headed by a member of the police who achieved inspector general rank or higher and would be composed of journalists, lawyers, human rights activists, academicians, non-government organisations, and other agencies. Zafar Ullah was appointed the lead investigating officer for the RAB. In late May 2013, Hasanul Haq Inu, information minister, told journalists the government was still analysing the DNA tests against the suspects and the investigation was proceeding according to law.
On 26 April 2012, the RAB, with a court order, oversaw the exhumation of the corpses at the Azimpur cemetery for a viscera test. The RAB said that the viscera test was for checking whether the couple had been poisoned and for DNA. Nowsher Alam Roman, who represented the families, was also present. The samples were sent to a lab in the United States for analysis. In August 2012, it was announced that two US labs had discovered the DNA of others, and the RAB announced it would at a later date test the DNA samples of suspects for a match. After the announcement, the RAB then came under criticism from Bangladesh's National DNA Profiling Laboratory Programme. The RAB had suggested that the analysis could not have been done by a domestic lab when the programme said it had handled over 1800 cases since 2006 and they would have been able to use the same technologies in Bangladesh.
After one year, 127 people had been interviewed about the case. The RAB also conducted videotaped interviews of the six-year-old son, and those images were shown on national television.
Even after a decade, no progress has been made in the investigation. The investigation probe report has been delayed 91 times as of 24 August 2022.
Suspects The names of 8 suspects were announced by Home Minister MK Alamgir in October 2012. Alamgir had been appointed the new Home Minister in September. The RAB arrested seven suspects around 9 October for their alleged involvement in the double murder, and the organisation made another related arrest on 9 February 2013. The father of Enamul, the suspect who was arrested in 2013, was reported missing 27 September 2012, shortly before the arrests in the case. Alamgir reported that several of the suspects were also alleged to be suspects in the murder of Narayan Chandra Datta Nitai. At the time of the arrests in 2012, no motive was revealed, but police alleged that several of the arrested were professional killers for hire. Rafique Islam, alleged robber Bakul Miah, alleged robber Masum Mintu Peyada, alleged robber Md Sayeed Sayeed, alleged robber Tanvir Rahman, Runi's acquaintance Kamrul Hassan Arun, driver Palash Rudra Paul, security guard Humayun alias Enamul, security guard – He was arrested on 9 February 2013.
The families of the victims were sceptical that the announced, alleged suspects were the perpetrators. In late January 2013, the RAB announced that the DNA identified by the labs had failed to match 13 samples, including samples from the suspects. Journalists had also been sceptical that the suspects were the perpetrators.
Calls for an international commission After a year-long investigation by the Bangladesh Police, the case was called stalled. One NGO specialising in press freedom and security, Reporters Without Borders, requested an international commission be established. This was also requested by the families.
Motive Lieutenant Colonel Ziaul Ahsan, then officer in charge from RAB in this investigation, said investigators believed the murder was pre-meditated and committed by someone who knew the victims. Police said at least two people murdered the couple. At first police reported that nothing was stolen, but later reports said Sarowar's laptop computer and cell phones could be missing. Another report, however, claimed that police had retrieved three cell phones as evidence. But in the petition brought to the High Court, it was learned that the couple's computers and laptops had been stolen.
Police announced on 26 February 2012 they were "almost certain" about the motive. However, the motive was never made public by investigators. More than a month after the murder, the organisation Human Rights and Peace for Bangladesh appealed to the High Court of Bangladesh on whether the police should reveal the motive and report their progress. In response to the case, the police were obliged to deliver a report to the court for informational purposes. The defendants in the case were the two law enforcement units and the Home Minister. By 18 April, when the High Court reassigned the case to RAB, the police admitted that they had not discovered a motive.