Publisher Shahzahan Bachchu shot dead in Munshiganj

Unidentified assailants have gunned down a publisher and writer in Munshiganj’s Sirajdikhan Upazila.

Four attackers on two motorcycles fled after shooting at Shahzahan Bachchu of Bishaka Prokashoni, known as a free-thinking writer, at his ancestral village Kakaldi on Monday afternoon, police said.       

The 65-year-old former general secretary of the Communist Party of Bangladesh or CPB’s Munshiganj district unit, died on the spot, Munshiganj Additional Superintendent of Police Asaduzzaman told bdnews24.com.

The body was sent to Munshiganj General Hospital for post-mortem examination.

Bachchu’s daughter Durba Zahan said in a Facebook post that his father was shot twice.

One of her friends commented on the post that some unidentified person called Durba on her mobile phone and informed her about the death.

When Durba dialled her father’s number, police received the call and confirmed it.

Mazharul Islam, a former president of publishers’ association Bangladesh Gyan O Srijonsheel Prokashok Samiti, said Banglabazar-based Bishakha Prokashoni published books of well-known poets like Nirmalendu Goon and Mahadev Saha. 

“Bachchu was a polite person,” he recalled. 

Current President Farid Ahmed said Bishakha was not a member of the association.

Deaths of secular writers, bloggers, online activists and a publisher in attacks by suspected Islamist militants shook Bangladesh for months after the murder of Avijit Roy near the Amar Ekushey Book Fair in Dhaka on Feb 26, 2015.

Avijit’s publisher Faisal Arefin Dipan, who ran Jagriti Prokashoni, was also hacked to death on Oct 31 the same year.

Ahmedur Rashid Tutul of publisher Shuddhaswar was attacked and injured the same day.

Militant groups claimed credit for most of these attacks and the law enforcers arrested many radical Islamists in connection with the attacks.

It was not immediately clear who were behind the murder of Bachchu.