The alleged ‘murder’ of Bangladesh Awami League MP Anwarul Azim Anar in Kolkata last month is getting curiouser and curiouser even as that country’s Detective Branch sleuths arrested a Jhenaidah district party leader on June 8 for being a key conspirator in the sensational case.
While Anar was allegedly involved in the multi-crore Bangladesh-India border gold smuggling racket and his alleged ‘murder’ is being linked to this massive illegal trade, a political angle appears to be emerging with the arrest of Awami League’s Jhenaidah municipality general secretary Kazi Kamal Ahmed Babu on May 8.
Babu, a Jhenaidah district Awami League joint general secretary, was produced in court and remanded to seven days’ police custody.
Detective Branch sources said that New York-based Akhtaruzzaman Shaheen, said to be the alleged mastermind of Anar’s ‘murder’ had instructed one of the supposed killers, a former extreme Left leader from Jhenaidah, Shimul Bhuiyan alias Aamanullah, to collect Taka 2 crore from Babu.
While it is not clear whether this amount is linked to Anar’s alleged ‘murder’, several messages exchanged between Bhuiyan and Babu over WhatsApp over May 15 and 23 indicate that it might be “hit money”.
But whether the money was Babu’s or how he may have received it and from whom is still not clear even as the investigation now appeared to have veered onto a political course.
Sources said that Bhuiyan returned to Dhaka on May 15 following the ‘killing’. He was allegedly told by Shaheen to pick up the money from Babu.
The following day, Babu and Bhuiyan spoke over WhatsApp. The duo met up on the Bhanga expressway in Faridpur on May 17 when Babu said he would pay him the money on May 23.
And in the event he failed to make the payment on May 23, the next date for handing over the money was fixed for May 26.
However, their plans went awry when the West Bengal Criminal Investigation Department declared on May 22 that Anar might have been murdered.
Babu allegedly went into hiding. Meanwhile, it has emerged that before his arrest, Babu destroyed three mobile phone handsets that he used and lodged a General Diary report at Jhenaidah police station.
Significantly, the West Bengal CID recovered some bone pieces from a drain at Bagjola in South 24 Parganas.
These have been sent for forensic examination, even as West Bengal CID Inspector General A K Chaturvedi told reporters that preliminary tests indicated these were human bones from the ribs and upper arms.
While the mystery of Anar’s alleged ‘murder’ continues almost a month after he disappeared in Kolkata – CCTV footage of a rented apartment in New Town – show Anar entering the flat on May 13.
The only footage released by the West Bengal CID showed Anar entering the flat that date, but there is no video clip of the MP exiting the apartment.
Earlier last week, the Nepal police handed over another suspect in Anar’s alleged ‘murder’, Mohammad Siyam Hossain, to the West Bengal CID.
Thirty-one-year-old Siyam was arrested in Kathmandu by the Nepal police after the DB shared his details with law enforcement officials of that country.
Siyam is said to be a key conspirator and he allegedly met Shaheen on May 20 or 21 when the latter flew from Delhi to Kathmandu. Shaheen was on his way to Dubai for New York.
Siyam’s arrest and subsequent interrogation has led the DB to prize out more details about the alleged ‘murder’ at the New Town flat. DB sleuths have found that once Anar was overpowered after a powerful general anaesthetic was administered on him.
The alleged killers supposedly stripped him of his clothes and took pictures of his body, which were then shared via WhatsApp by Bhuiyan with Babu.
The photos were shared with Babu for him to ‘show’ them to at least one senior central Awami League leader who has so far not been named by the DB.
Babu and Shaheen are cousin brothers. Shaheen supposedly shared Babu’s mobile number with Bhuiyan before the alleged ‘murder’.
Both Bangladesh DB and West Bengal CID sources suspect that two teams may have worked to kill Anar. While at least six persons have so far been arrested in Kolkata, Dhaka and Nepal, at least six others are said to be in detention in Bangladesh.
Jhenaidah Awami League sources today revealed to Northeast News that besides the gold smuggling angle there could be a likely political element to Anar’s alleged ‘murder’.
Video have reportedly surfaced, showing former Kaliganj upazila (Anar’s parliamentary constituency) Mayor Mustafizur Rahman Biju issuing open death threats against the MP just before the January 7 parliamentary election.
