Awami League minister, MPs accused of grabbing properties of Hindus, intimidating them

An organisation of religious minorities has accused some ruling Awami League MP and a Cabinet minister of forcibly occupying lands and homes of people from the community through intimidation.

Bangladesh Hindu-Buddhist-Christian Unity Council cited specific instances of alleged grabbing of properties and eviction by ministers and MPs in a press conference on Thursday.

 

The council’s General Secretary Rana Dasgupta, who is also a prosecutor at the International Crimes Tribunal, read out a prepared statement at the conference.

 

“Miscreants using the name of the ruling party are in a frenzy of grabbing houses, shops, lands, properties of temples, monasteries, churches of religious and ethnic minorities,” he alleged.

 

LGRD Minister Khandker Mosharraf Hossain, Parliament Whip Mahabub Ara Begum Gini, and Thakurgaon MP Dabirul Islam and Pirojpur lawmaker AKMA Awal were accused of taking forcible possession of properties.    

 

The unity council also called for setting up of minority cells in government and all political parties, apart from making other demands for the protection of the minorities.  

 

The council previously accused the BNP and Jamaat-e-Islami of setting fire to the houses and properties of religious minorities, grabbing their land and committing other atrocities.

 

But the latest allegations assumed significance as the fingers this time were pointed at the Awami League, which projects itself as a secular party.   

 

To put an end to the harassments, it demanded that rights and securities of the minorities be ensured as had been recently stressed by the US Congress.

  

The council further demanded that those who are grabbing lands and repressing minority people under political patronage be brought to justice to ensure the rights of the minorities.