Noore Alam (wearing maroon t-shirt) is being taken out of the house raided by RAB on Thursday. His family claim he was ‘picked up by authorities’ nine months ago.
One of the five who RAB claims to have arrested during a drive in Chittagong was picked up by ‘authorities’ from Nilphamari nine months ago, his family claim.
Noor Nahar Begum of Ukil Mahalla in Nilphamari town identified the person as his son Noore Alam, 22, after seeing the images of the arrested persons in TV Thursday.
Around 40 people posing as ‘men from the authorities’ on three microbuses and a sedan picked up Alam on Apr 11 this year, Begum said.
She said she filed a complaint at Nilphamari Sadar Police Station the following day.
But police could not find Alam, a fourth-year Bachelor with Honours student at Nilphamari Government College.
Nilphamari Sadar Police Station OC Md Babul Akter told bdnews24.com Begum filed the complaint over her son going missing on Apr 12.
“Now the members of his family have confirmed that the Noore Alam arrested during the RAB drive in Chittagong is the Noore Alam who had gone missing from Ukil Mahalla,” he added.
After the drive on a house in Chittagong’s Colonel Haat for several hours on Thursday morning, RAB said five persons were arrested with bomb-making materials.
The elite police unit claimed they were members of banned militant outfit Harkat-ul-Jihad al-Islami (HuJI).
RAB spokesperson Mufti Mahmud Khan went to Chittagong from Dhaka to brief the media.
The allegation against law-enforcing agencies of picking people up and denying having done so is not new in Bangladesh. Many families have claimed after killings of suspects in ‘crossfire during drives’ that they had been picked up earlier.
RAB-7 has denied the latest allegation of picking Alam up nine months ago before coming up with the claim to have arrested him only on Thursday.
“Many say a lot of things, but we know nothing about those,” RAB-7 Commander Colonel Mifta Uddin told bdnews24.com.
He said the ‘HuJI members’ rented the house in mid-November.
“There were five bus tickets on them. Some of them came to Chittagong on Nov 23 and the others came the following day,” he claimed.
RAB said in a media statement that Alam was a member of a militant group ‘313 Badarer Sainik’, headed by one Mufti Mainul Islam.
“Mufti Mainul remained inactive for some days after being arrested by RAB and then again started taking part in militant activities,” it added.
Source: Bd news24