Jamaat to arrange doa mahfil Friday

Jamaat-e-Islami will arrange doa mahfil across the country on Friday praying for the release of all its leaders and activists including Abdus Subhan, who has been awarded death penalty for war crimes.

This is for the first time, Jamaat, a key partner in the BNP-led 20-party alliance, refrained from calling hartal following announcement of verdicts against its leaders in war crimes cases.

Explaining changes in the strategy, Jamaat in a press statement this evening said all-out shutdowns are going on peacefully across the country to restore the people’s rights to vote, democracy, and an inclusive election under a nonparty administration.

“That’s why we are not announcing any separate programme against the government’s conspiracy to eliminate our top leaders and to destroy the party,” Jamaat’s acting chief Moqbul Ahmed said in the statement. 

Earlier in the day, a tribunal in Dhaka handed death penalty to Jamaat leader Abdus Subhan on three charges for committing crimes against humanity during the Liberation War in 1971.

The 79-year-old Jamaat nayeb-e-ameer was also sentenced to imprisonment until death on two charges and five years’ imprisonment for another.