Staff Reporter:
A group of miscreants verbally abused some 11-13 activists of Islami Andolan Bangladesh (IAB) and beat them indiscriminately with sticks during a door-to-door election campaign in Dakop upazila, Khulna on Tuesday.
The Islamist party’s leader, Charmonai Pir Mufti Syed Muhammad Rezaul Karim, alleged that activists of Jamaat-e-Islami were behind the “naked attack.”
Unless the authorities bring the alleged Jamaat activists to justice, IAB would take “tough measures,” he warned while speaking at a campaign rally in Kadamtoli area of Dhaka on Tuesday afternoon.
According to IAB Spokesperson Maulana Gazi Ataur Rahman, a women’s group of IAB, led by Rozina Begum, were seeking votes for Maulana Abu Sayeed, the party’s candidate in the Khulna-1 constituency, in Lakkikhola village, Pankhali union, Dakop upazila on Tuesday morning.
At one point, they ventured near the house of one Hormuj Sheikh, who invited them to the house. The women’s team obliged in good faith, only to find themselves abruptly confined to the house. Then, Hormuj Sheikh, Ilias, Amanullah and other accused entered the house, and hurled expletives and other insulting words at Rozina’s team.
At one point during the conversation with the women activists, the accused beat them up with firewood and other kinds of sticks.
Upon learning the incident, locals and IAB’s Dakop upazila leaders rescued the injured women and rushed them to the Upazila Health Complex. Rozina Begum has been admitted to the health facility with serious injuries, while the others have been discharged following first aid treatment, Maulana Gazi Ataur Rahman told reporters.
Maulana Gazi Ataur told reporters that the accused have crossed IAB’s “red line,” demanding the authorities arrest them immediately and impose “exemplary punishment.”
