Bangladesh condemns killing of Hindu criminal by mob, says not a communal attack

The interim government said that Amrit Mondal had arrived in the area allegedly to extort money and “lost his life during a clash with an angry local crowd”

NEW DELHI: Bangladesh’s interim government on Thursday condemned the killing of a Hindu criminal by a mob in Rajbari Town and said legal action will be taken against all persons involved in the incident.

Law enforcement officers stand guard as supporters of Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) acting chairman Tarique Rahman wait along the roadside to welcome their leader near the airport in Dhaka (AP)

The caretaker administration led by Muhammad Yunus issued a statement providing details of the killing of Amrit Mondal alias Samrat on Wednesday night to counter what it said was “misleading information” on the incident being spread on social media.

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The development came a week after a Hindu man named Dipu Chandra Das was lynched in Mymensingh after being accused of blasphemy. Bangladeshi authorities have arrested 12 people for Das’s murder. The lynching has drawn condemnation from governments across the world, including India.

The statement, issued in Bengali, described Mondal’s death in the Pangsha police station area of Rajbari as a “tragic murder”, and said information from the police and initial investigations indicated that the “incident was not a communal attack”.

Mondal had arrived in the area allegedly to extort money and “lost his life during a clash with an angry local crowd”. Mondal was an “accused in several serious cases, including murder and extortion cases registered in 2023”, and there are arrest warrants against him, the statement said.

“Police arrested Samrat’s associate Selim from the scene with a foreign pistol and a pipe gun. Three cases have already been filed in this incident,” the statement said.

“The government strongly condemns this killing. The government wants to make it clear that the government does not support any kind of illegal activities, mass beatings or violence,” it said, adding that legal action will be taken against all persons directly or indirectly involved in this incident.

The government expressed concern at efforts to “portray the incident as a communal attack by bringing up the religious identity of the deceased, which is completely baseless and malicious”. It urged people to “refrain from spreading misleading, provocative and sectarian statements”.

“The government is determined to establish the rule of law and justice,” the statement said.

The incident was reported in the Bangladeshi media hours after the return from self-exile of Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) leader Tarique Rahman, who said in an address that the “country belongs to…Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists and Christians”.