Jamaat chief put on 7-day remand

Court Correspondent :
A Dhaka court yesterday placed Jamaat-e-Islami Ameer Dr Md. Shafiqur Rahman, on a seven-day remand in a case filed with Jatrabari Police Station of the city under the Anti-Terrorism Act.
Metropolitan Magistrate Rajesh Chowdhury of Dhaka CMM Court passed the
order after Md Abul Bashar, an Inspector the Counter Terrorism and Transnational Crime (CTTC) unit of Dhaka Metropolitan Police and also the Investigation Officer of the case, produced Dr Shafique in the court with a ten-day remand plea.
While seeking remand, the CTTC official said Dr Shafique was directly and indirectly involved with assisting banned militant outfit Ansar Al Islam men to happen subversive activities in the country.
The official also said, Dr Shafique had links with the new militant outfit “Jama’atul Ansar Fil Hindal Sharqiya”. Moreover, he was allegedly aware of his son Dr Rafat Chowdhury’s militant activities. So he needs to be remanded to find out vital clues about the incident, the IO added.
It was mentioned that Rafat was arrested in connection with the same case on November 9. He is known as the Sylhet Regional Coordinator of Al-Qaeda-inspired militant outfit Ansar Al Islam and has been persuading young people to leave their homes for alleged Jihad, according to police.
However, defense submitted a petition seeking bail along with cancellation of the remand prayer on the grounds that their client’s name was not included in the First Information Report (FIR) of the case. He was implicated in the case just to harass him.
In the same case, three more accused were arrested and they had given confessional statements on different dates.
Hearing both sides, the court rejected the defense pleas and placed Dr Shafiqur Rahman on remand.
Earlier, a team of the Counter Terrorism and Transnational Crime (CTTC) unit arrested Shafiqur Rahman at about 1:00 am on Tuesday (December 13) from his Bashundhara house of the capital.