AL tickets of Nasirnagar accused cancelled
In face of criticism, the Awami League has cancelled nomination of two Brahmanbaria leaders -- charged by police with vandalising and attacking Hindu houses and temples in Nasirnagar five years ago -- for chairman posts in the union parishad polls to be held on November 11.
The nominations were announced on Tuesday.
The two are Dewan Atikur Rahman and Abul Hashem. Dewan is the incumbent chairman of Haripur union while Hashem holds the post in Nasirnagar sadar union. Dewan was named in the case's chargesheet as the mastermind of the attacks. Hashem was also named in the chargesheet along with 226 others.
In a statement today, the central committee of AL said Mohammad Wasim, instead of Atikur, will run for chairman in Haripur union while Putul Rani Biswas, not Hashem, will vie for the post in Nasirnagar sadar union.
Asked, AL Office Secretary Barrister Biplob Barua said the decision to nominate the two accused was made as they hid the information on their nomination forms. After AL President Sheikh Hasina learnt that they were facing charges of carrying out communal attack, she took the decision to scrap their nomination on Wednesday night.
The attacks on Hindu villagers' houses shocked the nation in 2016. Police pressed charges against the suspects in December 2017, said sources at Brahmanbaria Chief Judicial Magistrate Court.
Police arrested Atikur on January 5, 2017, in the capital's Bhatara area. The local government ministry suspended him from his post of UP chairman on January 23, 2017. The suspension was withdrawn later and he walked out of jail on bail on November 6, 2017.
On October 29, 2016, a group of villagers assaulted a Hindu man in Nasirnagar, saying he had hurt their religious sentiment with a Facebook post, and handed him to police.
The next day, 15 temples and more than 100 houses of Hindu villagers were vandalised. Valuables were looted and many of the houses were set on fire. Further attacks took place in the following weeks.
The Criminal Investigation Department later found out that the Hindu man who was assaulted and arrested over the Facebook post, did not make the post. Someone else gained access to his Facebook ID and made the post.