Bharat Bhushan: A hanging in Dhaka, courtesy Delhi
That Majed stayed as Ahmed Ali in Kolkata for two decades suggests that Indian intelligence agencies probably knew about him and that he may have been under their protection. A good indication of their complicity is the fact that Majed’s presence in Kolkata was not politicised. This is in contrast to the BJP’s high-pitched campaign against Mamata Banerjee in 2014 of harbouring Islamic terrorists
Did India just gift a
hanging to Bangladesh in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic?
On Sunday April 12, at one minute past midnight former Bangladesh Army
Captain Abdul Majed was hanged at Dhaka Central Jail. He was one of the
twelve Bangladesh Army officers convicted in the
assassination of the founder of Bangladesh, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman on August 15,
1975. They killed more than 20 members of Mujib’s family - only his two
daughters, Sheikh Hasina and Sheikh Rehana, being out of the
country, fortuitously escaped the bloodbath.
Five of the convicts
were tried and hanged in Dhaka in January 2010. Another accused died a natural
death in hiding, in Zimbabwe. Majed was one of the remaining six convicts. Five
still remain at large. Majed was also accused
in the killing of four leaders of the Bangladesh freedom movement in Dhaka jail
-- two former Prime Ministers, a former Vice President and a former Home
Minister.
Reports of Majed’s
arrest give conflicting facts. According to Monirul Islam, Chief of
Counterterrorism and Transnational Crime unit at Dhaka Metropolitan Police,
Majed was arrested on April 7 at Mirpur Sare Egaro Bus Stand in the capital.
However, a sub-inspector of the same unit declared in court that the arrest was
from Gabtoli Bus Stand, 19 km away. Reports also contradict each other about
whether Majed reached Dhaka by air or through the land border. The dates of his
arrival also vary.
Majed was apparently
hiding in India for nearly two decades. He escaped Bangladesh in 1996 and is
said to have lived as a fugitive in West Asia and North Africa before coming to
India. It was in 2009-10 that the then Prime Minister Sheikh
Hasina began demanding his return from India. Majed lived in Kolkota
under the name of Ahmed Ali in a house on Bedford Lane, off prestigious Park
Street. He was known to be pious, offering prayers five times a day and because
he tutored children in English he was called “Mastermoshai of English”. He
married a widow named Zareena and had a six year old daughter with her. His
Bangladeshi wife, Saleha, lives in Dhaka.
Majed aka Ahmed Ali
had an Aadhar card and two Indian passports – one (apparently fake) issued in
2007 and another issued on 24 May 2017, an original. Majed apparently left home
on February 21 to purchase medicines but never returned. His mobile phone was
switched off. His Indian wife, Zareena, filed a ‘missing person’ report with
Kolkata police on February 22. CCTV footage examined by the police showed that
he was followed by four men who boarded the same bus. He next resurfaced in
Dhaka.
The year 1975 was an
unusual year in Bangladesh. Sheikh Mujib had been elected president of
Bangladesh in June, 1975. He proceeded to abolish all political parties and
independent media ostensibly to bring order in the country. He was seen as
becoming dictatorial and his one-party ‘national unity government’ of Bangladesh
Krishak Sramik Awami League became deeply unpopular because of rampant
corruption, misuse of the judiciary, food shortages and a famine. Sheikh Mujib
was assassinated in these conditions. Within four years of its spectacular
success the Bangladesh revolution had devoured its own children.
The beneficiaries of
the coup brought in an Indemnity Act to give immunity from legal action to the
assassins. It was brought in as a presidential ordinance by Mujib’s successor
and a key conspirator, President Khondaker Mostaq Ahmad and was later passed by
Parliament as the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution. Military dictators who
followed him -- Ziaur Rehman and H M Ershad -- extended the law to cover
military coups and martial law decrees. The assassins of Mujib were rewarded
with promotions and government jobs.
However, when the
Awami League swept to power in 1996, Sheikh
Hasina scrapped the Indemnity Act paving the way, after two decades,
for the trial of the killers of her father. The accused, including Majed, fled
Bangladesh. That Majed stayed as
Ahmed Ali in Kolkata for two decades suggests that Indian intelligence agencies
probably knew about him and that he may have been under their protection. A
good indication of their complicity is the fact that Majed’s presence in
Kolkata was not politicised. This is in contrast to the BJP’s high-pitched
campaign against Mamata Banerjee in 2014 of harbouring Islamic terrorists like
Sheikh Rahmatullah of Jamat-ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh, convicted in the Burdwan
bomb blast.
Perhaps by eventually
facilitating his recovery and repatriation, India was reciprocating
Bangladesh’s friendly gesture in handing over top ULFA insurgents nearly nine
years ago. More proximately,
there was a need to assuage popular anger in Bangladesh over the highlighting
of illegal Bangladeshi immigrants (“termites” in the memorable language of then
BJP president Amit Shah) in the context of the National Register of Citizens
operations in Assam. Sheikh Hasina is facing uncomfortable questions at home
over India’s NRC and possible repatriation of Bangladeshi illegal immigrants.
India’s recent Citizenship Amendment Act is also premised on the humiliating
supposition for Bangladesh that minorities are persecuted there. Handing over a
fugitive convicted of her father’s murder would be one way of placating her.
Prime Minister
Narendra Modi was scheduled to visit Dhaka on March 17 to witness the roll-out
of year-long celebrations marking the birth centenary of the nation’s founding
father. It is possible that the timing of his assassin’s hand-over and a quick
hanging would have set the stage favourably for the PM’s participation.
Eventually the
coronavirus pandemic led Bangladesh to withdraw invitations to world leaders to
participate and Prime Minister Modi sent a video message instead. By then,
however, Majed’s cover had been blown, a missing person report lodged and
Bangladesh perhaps informed about his repatriation. It is understood that Majed
was handed over, possibly at the land border crossing of Petrapol – Benapole,
days after the March 24 national lockdown. Diplomatic purpose
would perhaps have been best served if the entire play was kept undercover.
However, unnamed Indian sources chose to tom-tom the botched up repatriation as
a major achievement of India-Bangladesh joint intelligence cooperation.
see also
Haunted by unification: A Bangladeshi view of partition
An Open Letter to the world on the Bangladesh crisis of 1971
Glory Days, or remembering how Indians love(d) China
Syed Badrul Ahsan - In Dhaka, return of a spectre
