Dhaka: In yet another attack on a Hindu in Muslim-majority Bangladesh, a 50-year-old Mathematics lecturer at the Nazimuddin Government University College, was hacked with lethal weapons by the attackers who stormed his residence in Madaripur in southwestern Bangladesh on Wednesday.
The lecturer happens to be the only Hindu victim to have survived an attack by the Islamists, who have hacked to death four other members from the community in recent months.
Suspected Islamists have killed a number of secular activists, Hindus and other minorities across the country in recent months prompting authorities to launch a nationwide anti-militant clampdown since Friday.
Bangladesh authorities have detained nearly 12,000 people in a nationwide crackdown to halt a spate of deadly attacks. Some of those arrested were linked with outlawed Jamaatul Mujahedeen Bangladesh.
Hindu priest threatened
In another incident, a Hindu priest of the Ramakrishna Ashram Mission, Dhaka, has received a death threat from suspected Islamists, who claim to be ISIS followers, if he continues to preach in ‘Islamic Bangladesh’.
Following the incident, the authorities have beefed up security around the area.
“The security of the [RK] Mission has been intensified as the priest filed a general diary with us,” duty officer of the city’s Wari police station told PTI.
The officer declined to disclose the name of the priest.
The mission officials were not immediately available for comments but police said the priest received the threatening letter last evening on a computer-composed IS letterhead with perpetrator identifying him as one AB Siddiqui.
“Bangladesh is an Islamic state. You can’t preach your religion here. If you continue preaching, you’ll be hacked to death with machetes between the 20th and 30th,” the officer quoted the letter as saying.
The letter, he said, did not mention any month.
Though most of the attacks were claimed by the Islamic State or its affiliates and other similar extremist groups, the Bangladesh government has repeatedly dismissed the claims and said the attacks were carried out by home-grown outfits linked to the opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party.
(With PTI inputs)
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