Police locate ‘abducted’ columnist Farhad Mazhar in Khulna

Columnist Farhad Mazhar, a critic of the government, went missing after leaving his Dhaka home early Monday and police anonymously said he was located about 250 kilometres away in Khulna region in a quickly unfolding event.

Staff Correspondentbdnews24.com
Published : 3 July 2017, 10:40 AM
Updated : 3 July 2017, 02:11 PM

“We have been able to find his location in the country’s southwestern region," the senior official told bdnews24.com, seeking anonymity as the case is sensitive.

Police are keeping surveillance and trying to rescue Mazhar, said Biplob Kumar Saha, deputy commissioner of Dhaka Metropolitan Police. 

“The police are trying to trace him with the help of technology. But the matter is still very mysterious,” said Saha.

Detectives raided a location in Khulna’s Baira but did not find Mazhar, said SM Shafiullah, Khulna additional superintendent of police, whose team has been getting instructions from the headquarters in Dhaka.    

After Mazhar went missing, a police complaint was filed by one of his relatives around 10am.

The 70-year-old left his home in Dhaka’s Shyamoli shortly after 5:00am, following a phone call, said Adabar Police SI Mohsin Ali.

Mazhar later called his wife on her mobile and asked her to manage Tk 3.5 million for ransom, he said.

bdnews24.com reached the columnist's wife Farida Akhter by phone. "I am busy, can't talk now," she said before hanging up.

Mazhar's family friend and writer Goutam Das said he was called away by some people in the morning.

He called his family 24 minutes after he left home -- to say he was being abducted, according to Das.    

Mazhar made the call using his own phone, a family member told bdnews24.com correspondent Liton Haider.

“He said he’ll be killed unless his abductors are paid Tk 3.5 million.”

The family could not name any suspect behind the abduction.

Mazhar lived in a building called Haque Garden at Shyamoli’s Ring Road. Senior police officers, including the Adabar OC, have gone over to the house.

The BNP has already pointed the finger at the government, blaming Mazhar’s disappearance “on one of its agencies”.

“We don’t think this happened without the government’s knowledge. Surely one of its teams or agencies is involved in this incident,” said BNP leader Ruhul Kabir Rizvi during an emergency media briefing at the party’s headquarters in Naya Paltan.     

A self-proclaimed Marxist, Mazhar started a controversy by opposing Ganajagaran Mancha, a mass campaign that started in 2013 calling for maximum penalty to war criminals from Bangladesh’s liberation struggle.

But he was widely criticised by left-leaning parties for his statements supporting Hifazat-e-Islam, a radical Islamist outfit that also opposed the Shahbagh-based campaign.

Mazhar, appearing on TV talk shows, likened several media outlets to terrorists, and said their assaults during violent shutdowns enforced by the BNP-led alliance were ‘justified’.

During a meeting, he had advised BNP chief Khaleda Zia to start a tougher anti-government movement.

Mazhar received an economics degree in the US after graduating in pharmacy from Dhaka University.

He returned home to Bangladesh to start a neo-agricultural movement through his organisation UBINIG.

Mazhar, known for his grey ponytail and preference for ‘lungis’, has been editing a publication called Chintaa, or Thought.