On Tuesday, August 6, Separate Dhaka Metropolitan Magistrate Courts granted bail to 2200 members of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) and banned outfit Jamaat-e-Islami. They had been lodged in jail over recent turmoil across the country centring quota reform movement.
The accused who have been granted bail include BNP standing committee members Amir Khasru Mahmud Chowdhury, Nazrul Islam Khan, Senior Joint Secretary General Ruhul Kabir Rizvi, Shamsur Rahman alias Shimul Biswas, Saiful Alam Nirob, Rafikul Alam Maznu, Jamaat Secretary General Mia Golam Parwar and Bangladesh Jatiya Party Chairman Andaleev Rahman Partho.
Several other inmates who have been released on bail belong to the Pakistan-linked Jamaat-e-Islami (JeI) Bangladesh, the Islamist radical banned group, that has been running havoc on the streets of Bangladesh after the violent ouster of Sheikh Hasina and terrorising minority communities, particularly, Hindus.
Earlier, OpIndia reported how Pakistan’s ISI, Bangladesh Nationalist Party and Bangladesh JeI were the main actors that orchestrated and fueled the Hasina Out campaign in India’s neighbourhood. It is pertinent to note that JeI is a banned Islamist outfit that was responsible for the genocide of the Hindus and Bengali-speaking Muslims during the 1971 war.
India banned JeI in February 2019 in the wake of the terror attack in Pulwama that claimed the lives of forty paramilitary CRPF members.
Back then, the government had detained 350 leaders of the Jihadi terror outfit. Moreover, 70-Srinagar-based bank accounts were seized, assets worth Rs 52 crore were confiscated and action was initiated under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act. The government crackdown had also affected the separatist organisation’s 400 schools, 350 mosques and 1000 seminaries across Jammu and Kashmir. In 2019 it was estimated that Jamaat-e-Islami has properties worth Rs 4,500 crores.
This year, on 27th February, the Union Home Ministry extended the ban on Jamaat-e-Islami (JeI) Jammu and Kashmir for another five years with immediate effect declaring it as an “unlawful association.”
The radical Jamaat-e-Islami J&K has long been at the centre of the Kashmir dispute, supporting separatist ideas and contesting Indian sovereignty over the area. It adheres to the teachings of Hasan Al Banna, Syed Qutb and Maulana Maududi which state that politics and society must be in line with Sharia. It backs Pakistan’s illegal claim to Kashmir.
Apart from terror activities, JeI Hind has been fueling and attempting to mainstream radicalism and extremism in India. In October 2023, the radical Islamic organisation Jamaat-e-Islami Hind (JIH) hosted an event to show ‘solidarity’ with the Hamas terrorists who massacred hundreds of innocent civilians in Israel.
OpIndia earlier widely reported how Jamaat-e-Islami orchestrated the hijab protests in Karnataka using foreign funds. Apart from SIMI’s offshoot PFI, Jamaat-e-Islami also played an active role during the Hijab protest in Karnataka. Incidentally, the Hijab protesters had also received backing from the Pakistan branch of JeI and the nexus indicated that a meticulous plan had been hatched to instigate Muslim students in the coastal districts of Udupi, Dakshina Kannada to create chaos that could have eventually been used to radicalise and recruit young Muslims into their organisation.
The radical Islamist outfit had also supported AAP councillor Tahir Hussain who was arrested in connection with the murder of Intelligence Bureau sleuth Ankit Sharma during the anti-Hindu Delhi riots.
Now, amidst the unrest in Bangladesh, Islamists, including members of JeI have seen an opportunity to kill and torture the minority Hindus in the country and loot their properties. OpIndia has extensively been reporting on how Hindu minorities are being selectively targeted by Islamists under the garb of civil disobedience and non-cooperation with the Sheikh Hasina government.
