Ninety-five border guards were Saturday sentenced to jail terms for a maximum of seven years for revolting in Bangladesh’s south-eastern Rangamati district as part of the bloody 2009 mutiny that killed 57 army officers, including Major General Shakil Ahmed, the then chief of the paramilitary force.

A Special Court-15, headed by Col Zahedur Rahman, in separate verdicts sentenced ninety-five Jawans of 9 and 18 rifles battalions of Bangladesh Border Guard (BGB) for jail terms ranging from four months to seven years for their involvement in mutiny in Rangamati.

The Court also fined each of the convicts Taka 100. Seventy-four of the total 95 convicts were from the 9 Rifles Battalion while 21 were from the 18 Rifles Battalion, Star online reported Saturday.

The BGB men revolted against their officers at the battalion headquarters on 26th February 2009, looted firearms from the armoury and attacked the residences of the then commander and other officers, the report said. Last week, the government was granted more time by the court to probe the bloody mutiny that killed 74 people as it fixed 3rd March for indictment hearing against the “core suspects”.

Metropolitan Sessions Judge Mohammad Zohurul Haque last month took cognizance charges against 800 out of 824 suspected core culprits in the 25th-26th February carnage inside the Bangladesh Rifles (BDR), now renamed as Border Guards Bangladesh (BGB), headquarters at Pilkhana in Dhaka.

Criminal Investigation Department (CID) in July last year formally charged 801 BDR soldiers and 23 civilians, including former BNP lawmaker Nasiruddin Ahmed Pintu.

In line with a Supreme Court directive, the government earlier decided that the BDR soldiers who were directly linked to the killings, lootings and arsons would be tried in a Speedy Trial Tribunal under the civil Penal Code.

The trial of several thousand rebel soldiers was underway in 11 special BDR courts on ordinary mutiny charges under the BDR Act, which prescribed a maximum seven years of imprisonment. Several hundred of them were already jailed under the process.

On 1st February, 172 border guards received upto seven years of rigorous imprisonment for their involvement in the mutiny in Dhaka and north-eastern Sylhet.

Twenty-three jawans of 40 Rifles Battalion were sentenced to jail terms up to six years on 16th January  for revolting in Phulbari sub-division of Dinajpur district.

Special Court-15 jailed 46 border guards on 13th January to prison terms ranging from four months to seven years for the rebellion in Matiranga sub-division in Chittagong’s Khagrachhari district.