Unknown person gave IS cap to Holey Artisan café attack convict at court

Death row convict in the Holey Artisan café attack case Rakibul Hasan Regan today claimed that he got the prayer cap emblazoned with IS logo from an unknown person at the crowded court premises on the day of the verdict on November 27.

“I do not know the person who gave the cap to me,” Regan said after Judge Md Majibur Rahman of the Anti-Terrorism Special Tribunal of Dhaka asked him about the source of the cap.

The “Neo JMB” militant was produced before the court today along with six others in a case filed under the Anti-Terrorism Act following a raid at Kalyanpur militant den on July 26, 2016.

Replying to a query, Regan told the tribunal that he took the cap and wore it as it was inscribed with words of Kalima, the declaration of Islamic faith, court sources said.

He himself gave a cap to Jahangir Hossain alias Rajib Gandhi, also a death row convict in the café attack case, Regan said replying to another query.   

Rajib was seen wearing a similar cap in the prison van on their way back to jail from the court on that day.

Today, police did not allow the media in the courtroom for coverage amid the widespread outrage over carrying IS cap by militants.  

Muntasirul Islam, deputy commissioner of Lalbagh Division, said he was unaware about the issue.

Journalists, however, covered the whole trial proceedings of the café attack case without any barrier.

Meanwhile, Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan today said the wearing of the IS cap is nothing alarming as they have always said this is their ideology, reports UNB. 

“We’re always saying there’s no IS in our country and they’re homegrown militants. They always wanted to be connected with IS and it was even confirmed by the terrorist organisation itself,” he added.

Earlier, the prisons and the police authorities apparently traded blame over how the militants got the caps.

Police on November 28 said they in their primary finding found that the caps were brought from jail while prisons officials on November 30 said the caps were handed to the militants at the court.

Regan, Rajib, and five other militants were awarded death for their involvement in the 2016 attack in the capital’s Gulshan, which left 22 people, including 17 foreigners, dead.

As soon as the court completed judgement delivery on that day, wore the cap inside the dock. Rajib was seen with a similar cap in the prison van.