The Detective Branch has made almost no headway in the investigation of the attacks on offices of Prothom Alo and the Daily Star since it took over the cases on January 6.

The Detective Branch could neither arrest anyone nor confirm the political identities of any of the 37 arrested in two cases filed over the attacks and arson that began late December 18.

New Age editor and Editors’ Council president Nurul Kabir was harassed when he went in front of The Daily Star office early December 19 to rescue the journalists and staff trapped in the office during the fire.

Authorities of the two newspapers on December 23 filed separate cases with the Tejgaon police station. The case file by Prothom Alo accused 400-500 unnamed people, and the case filed by the Daily Star accused 350-400 unnamed people. 

Following the cases, the police and the Rapid Action Battalion arrested 11 people for attacking the Daily Star office and 26 others for attacking Prothom Alo office.

The arrested people include Mainul Islam, Julfikar Ali, Almas Ali, Jubair Hasan, Abdur Rahman Palash, Ainul Haque Kashemi, Md Faisal, Mohammad Azim, Raju Hossain, Pranta Shikder, Jannatul Naim, Sayedur Rahman and Raju Hossain Chand.

According to Detective Branch officials involved in probing the cases, they took the charges of investigating the cases on January 6, but could not arrest anyone more.

The metropolitan police’s DB chief, additional commissioner Md Shafiqul Islam, claimed that their investigation was not slow.  ‘We are dealing with the two cases very seriously so that no innocent person is charged or arrested.’

Asked whether they could confirm the political identities of the detained people in the cases, he replied in the negative and said that they were not focusing on the issue.

‘We are prioritizing the accused people’s criminal involvement over their identities,’ he said.

Officials involved in the investigations said that they could not increase the pace of the probe to ensure security in many big events, including the Bangladesh Nationalist Party chairman Tarique Rahman’s homecoming, former prime minister Khaleda Zia’s death and the national election, which is scheduled for February 12.  

According to documents of the cases, Prothom Alo incurred a loss of Tk 32 crore and The Daily Star suffered a loss of Tk 40 crore in the attacks.