Attack planned, to grab Hindu land: NHRC

The National Human Rights Commission today said the attack on Hindus in Brahmanbaria’s Nasirnagar was deliberate and aimed to grab lands of the minority community.

- Indian High Commission team visits affected Hindus

- Hindu group claims land grabbing was main intention

- ‘Ahle Sunnat, Touhidi Janata involved’ in attack

“The attack was carried out to drive away the Hindus from their land,” Enamul Haque Chowdhury, chief of the national rights body’s fact finding committee visiting the spot, told The Daily Star.

The three-member committee led by NHRC member Chowdhury reached Nasirnagar around 10:35am and spoke to temple priests and eyewitnesses over Sunday’s incident.

Meanwhile, a delegation of the Indian High Commission, led by its First Secretary Rajesh Uike visited the affected sites today.

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Zealots attacked at least five temples in Brahmanbaria’s Nasirnagar and ransacked over 100 Hindu houses and looted them over a Facebook post that allegedly hurt Muslim sentiment.

‘AHLE SUNNAT, TOUHIDI JANATA INVOLVED’

Touhidi Janata and Ahle Sunnat Wal Jamaat had called two protest rallies for Sunday over the Facebook post. The rampage on Hindus was carried out after the rallies.

“The members of the organisations urged locals over loudspeakers asked shop owners to shut their outlets and join their programme, according to locals and victims,” Chowdhury said.

“If the organisers deny their involvement with the attack, then we will say they are telling lie,” he said during observation of the affected temples and areas of Nasirnagar.

The national human rights official suspected that the attack was a move of “conspiracy against the government”.

Besides, a ten-member delegation of Hindu-Boudhha-Christian Oikya Parishad also visited the affected victims of the Hindu minority group and damaged temples in the area.

“The main reason behind the attack is to occupy lands of the Hindus,” Rana Das Gupta, general secretary of the forum, told our staff correspondent while visiting Gaura temple.

He pulled up on the local administration, law enforcers, Union Parishad chairman and lawmaker claiming they were “inactive during the attack, and hence, responsible for it”.