Twenty-two-year-old Abu Sayed stood on a street in Rangpur and stretched his arms out in defiance of the tyranny being unleashed just yards away.
His death, moments later at the hands of the agents of that tyranny, became the image and moment that superpowered a movement into an uprising on 16 July, 2024.
Now, a year later, a joint investigation by Drik Picture Library in Dhaka and Forensic Architecture in London has found conclusive evidence that Abu Sayed was deliberately shot and killed by police using live ammunition.
This act violates both Bangladeshi law and international human rights standards.
At the time, the police under the Awami League regime, had tried to distance itself from the killing.
Drik unveiled the findings in the form of a documentary film titled "Shoot me, I bare my chest: A counter forensic investigation of the killing of Abu Sayed" in Dhaka today.
Dhaka Stream has obtained a copy of the investigation report.
Abu Sayed's killing, captured on video and now reconstructed through a forensic analysis, lays bare the murder that shook the nation to its core.
The Begum Rokeya University student was the first reported death of a protester in police firing during the protests against quotas in civil service jobs, waged by students and job-seekers a year ago.
But at the time, the first information report (FIR) filed at the Tajhat Police Station soon after his death said Sayed was not a victim of police firing. The report accused 2,000–3,000 unidentified individuals, including BNP and Jamaat-Shibir protesters, of the murder.
The police had claimed that these protesters had fired weapons and showered brickbats, killing "an individual". The FIR stated that the police only found out later that it was one Abu Sayed, an undergrad at Begum Rokeya University.
The AL claims refuted in the report
According to the report, the investigation was able to refute three claims made by the Awami League regarding the death of Abu Sayed.
The claims, as presented in the report, are: "He was killed by a rock thrown by fellow protesters; Police only used rubber bullets during the incident; Protesters took 4–5 hours to take him to the hospital, and their negligence contributed to his death.
"These assertions originate from two primary sources: a video posted by the Awami League's official Facebook page, and a leaked phone call, posted to YouTube and widely circulated, both containing audio attributed to [then prime minister] Sheikh Hasina."
Reconstructing the killing
In an investigation into the killing of Sayed outside Begum Rokeya University in Rangpur, researchers from Drik and Forensic Architecture wove together a tapestry of evidence, such as eyewitness testimonies, raw video footage, intricate spatial modelling, and forensic analysis, to uncover the truth.
Their findings paint a stark and disturbing picture.
Investigators gathered video and photographic evidence from social media, livestreams, journalists, and eyewitnesses, verifying the authenticity of each file through metadata analysis, geolocation, and timestamping.
Frame by frame, they synchronised multiple videos, aligning gunshots, megaphone announcements, and crowd movements to build an accurate timeline of the moments leading up to Abu Sayed's death.
Using drone imagery and ground-level photography, the team constructed a precise 3D photogrammetry model of the protest site, pinpointing the exact positions of the police, protesters, and Sayed at the fatal instant. Forensic analysis of his wounds, combined with the scatter of pellets, revealed a chilling truth: Abu Sayed was shot with birdshot fired from a 12-bore pump-action shotgun at close range, approximately 14.22 metres, directly contradicting police claims of rubber bullets or brick chip-inflicted injuries.
Spatial heat maps showed that Abu Sayed was standing isolated, unarmed, and posed no immediate threat. No warning was issued before the police opened fire, violating both Bangladeshi law and international policing standards. Analysis of shell casings and recovered munitions confirmed the use of live birdshot ammunition, unsuitable and unlawful for crowd control.
The official narrative, that Sayed was killed by protester violence, delayed medical care, collapsed under the weight of forensic evidence.
Medical records confirmed the cause of death: multiple gunshot wounds and massive blood loss. This was even later varied by the fact-finding report of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) that Sayed was deliberately shot multiple times in the chest with shotguns loaded with lethal metal pellets.
The timeline of 16 July, 2024
Abu Sayed's mother, Monowara Begum, felt uneasy in the morning as she prepared food in their home in Babanpur, Pirganj upazila.
From 2:03pm to 3:00pm, a quota reform protest escalated outside Begum Rokeya University. Police used tear gas and batons as most students fled. Sayed remained standing.
Both DPL and FA's joint investigation determined the exact time when Sayed was shot by the police.
According to the investigation, police fired live rounds at 2:17pm.
The first shot hit Sayed at 2:17:19, the second and third shots eight and nine seconds later.
At 2:18pm, people present there started taking Sayed to Rangpur Medical College Hospital.
At 3:05pm, he was declared dead on arrival, with multiple shotgun wounds and bleeding from his nose.
A turning point for Bangladesh
Abu Sayed's killing sent shockwaves across Bangladesh. News of his death spread rapidly on social media, sparking mass protests that soon morphed into the July Uprising. Within weeks, Sheikh Hasina's government fell.
The investigation by Drik Picture Library and Forensic Architecture provides the most comprehensive evidence to date that Sayed's killing was not an accident, nor the result of "mob violence" as officials claimed, but an unlawful, deliberate act of state violence.
'Allowed us to refute claim the he was killed by fellow protesters'
"The exact duration between the last time he was shot and the moment he was taken to the hospital allowed us to refute one of the claims made by the state—that one of the reasons he was killed was due to protesters," Jumana Bawazir, an advanced researcher of forensic technology who worked on the investigation, told Dhaka Stream.
"Being able to synchronise footage both in space and time allows us to really examine the state's claims, confront them, and critically assess what we are being told. It also allows us to provide a different narrative—one that is closer to the truth, she added.
There was a public interview posted online by the forensic doctor, and this was information the investigators used and needed, she said.
There was also an Amnesty International report, as well as reports from human rights groups. We were part of that effort, which discussed the physician's report about how the pictures of the body and the wounds revealed that he was shot by metal pellets.
"Is it lethal? No. It's not an appropriate type of ammunition—it is made for hunting. It's entirely inappropriate to be used for crowd control.
"Therefore, even with a so-called "less-lethal" weapon, they had no justification. He was not part of the crowd. He should not have been targeted at all. There was no reason to shoot him."
Nicholas Masterton, a forensic technology researcher who also worked on the investigation, said, "The photographic material we received came from the Drake Picture Library—images captured by photojournalists who were present when Sayed was killed.
"We also gathered videos taken around the same time by people on the ground. These photographs and videos were central to one of the key methodologies we use at Forensic Architecture: photogrammetry."
He explained that photogrammetry is a process where, if there are enough images of an object or environment, computational methods can be used to assemble them into a 3D model, from which detailed spatial analysis can be conducted.
"We also used a process known as camera matching or camera tracing. Once the position of a camera in three-dimensional space is determined, we can begin to extract accurate measurements. Even having a single known dimension within the scene allows us to scale the entire environment and build an architectural reconstruction of the site," said Masterton.
Drone footage was also a crucial element of the investigation because it provided a comprehensive overview of the area, something he said investigators wouldn't have been able to achieve as fully by using other methods.
"Drone imagery is especially valuable for creating complete 3D models of spaces.
"This was particularly important in this case, as it allowed us to precisely map the positions of everyone involved in the shooting. We were able to establish the exact locations of the police officers who fired the shots, as well as pinpoint where Sayed was standing when he was hit by the first, second, and third bullets."
This article was updated on July 12, 2024 to include the section titled 'The AL claims refuted in the report
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