Dhaka: A Dhaka court acquitted former private university teacher Hasnat Karim and Canadian student Tahmid Hasib Khan, two survivors of the deadly siege at a Gulshan café on 1 July, from the charges brought against them under section 54 in connection with the attack.

Dhaka Metropolitan magistrate Nur Nabi issued the order on Wednesday morning.

The acquittal sets Tahmid free but Hasnat will remain behind the bars as he was shown arrested in a case filed on 4 July with Gulshan police under The Anti-Terrorism Act.

Court’s registration officer Ronop Kumar Bhakta told NTV Online the court is waiting for an order based on the hearing conducted over a new charge brought against Tahmid for hiding information.

Tahmid Hasib Khan was released from jail on 2 October night.

‘We released him at about 10:15 pm after the bail order reached the jail,’ said Jahangir Kabir, Senior Jail Super of Dhaka Central Jail at Keraniganj.

Earlier in the day, a court granted bail to Tahmid Hasib Khan. Dhaka Metropolitan Magistrate Laskar Sohel Rana issued the order following a bail petition filed by Tahmid’s counsel.

On 28 September, inspector Humyan Kabir of the Counter Terrorism and Transnational Crime (CTTC) unit of Dhaka Metropolitan Police (DMP) submitted a report to a court to relieve Tahmid, a Bangladeshi-origin Canadian, from the charge.

On 20 August, a court sent Tahmid to jail rejecting his bail plea when he was produced before it on completion of his custody period in connection with the Gulshan terror attack.

On 3 August, police arrested Hasnat and Tahmid in a residence at Bashundhara residential area in Dhaka at about 9:00pm.

On 4 August, police shown them arrested under section 54 on Wednesday night.

‘We can confirm that they were arrested under Section 54 of CrPC (criminal procedure),’ police spokesperson A.K.M Shahidur Rahman, referring to a law under which police can detain someone for suspicion over any crime.

Both of them were placed on eight-day police custody for interrogation over the terror attack.

Tahmid and Hasnat Karim were rescued along with 12 others during the commando operation at the Holey Artisan Bakery at the city’s diplomatic zone Gulshan on 2 July following a 12-hour hostage standoff.

Militants killed 22 people, mostly foreigners, when they raided the upscale Holey Artisan restaurant on the night of 1 July, as Bangladesh reels from a series of gruesome killings by Islamists.

Army commandoes stormed the cafe the next morning, killing all five attackers and rescuing 13 people.

The Islamic State (IS) group claimed responsibility for the attack, but police blame home-grown extremist group Jamayetul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB).

Hasnat Karim and Tahmid were both inside the Holey Artisan cafe when gunmen raided the premises on the night of 1 July.

But neither man has been seen in public since the end of the siege when commandos stormed the cafe in Dhaka’s upmarket Gulshan neighbourhood on the morning of 2 July.

Their families have previously said that both Karim and Khan were being held by the security services, insisting there is no evidence to link them to the attackers and that they were no more than innocent bystanders.