The freedom fighters and pro-liberation people of Faridpur yesterday said that they would not let Jamaat-e-Islami leader Ali Ahsan Mohammad Mujahid to be buried in the district considering the grave crimes he had committed during the 1971 Liberation War.
Mujahid’s family members are yet to decide burial of the war criminal, who is set to be hanged as per the order of the International Crimes Tribunal. However, local Jamaat leaders said that they would bury Mujahid at the town’s Alipur graveyard.
Another source close to Mujahid, the Jamaat secretary general, said that he might be buried on the premises of his ancestral house at west Khabashpur of the town to avoid resistance by the war crimes trial supporters.
Mujahid will have to walk gallows if his last lifeline – seeking presidential clemency – is rejected. He was sentenced to death for masterminding the killing of intellectuals in December – at the fag end of the war.
The International Crimes Tribunal in 2013 sentenced Mujahid to death for the murder and torture of Hindus at Bakchar of Faridpur on May 13, 1971. A woman was also raped and the Hindus of the entire village had been forced to leave the area for India. The apex court, however, commuted the sentence to life in prison.
Faridpur district freedom fighters’ Commander Abul Foyez Shanewaz told the Dhaka Tribune that a cruel person like Mujahid could not be buried in the soil of the district. “We will resist any move to bury him here,” he said.
Earlier, locals brought out a procession soon after the top court rejected Mujahid’s review petition.
Chittoranjan Ghosh, a 70-year-old man, had lost three members of his family in the Eshangopalpur massacre on May 2, 1971. At least 29 people were killed by the Pakistani Army on that day with the assistance of local al-Badr force. He welcomed the judgement and demanded that the government arrange any other place than Faridpur for Mujahid’s burial.
Freedom fighter MB Shamsuddin said that Mujahid should not be allowed to be buried in Faridpur only for the massacre at Bakchar village under sadar upazila.
Ali Afzal Mohammad Khales, younger brother of Mujahid, told the Dhaka Tribune that they were yet to decide where to bury him.
As the top leader of al-Badr force, Mujahid had always instigated, actively suggested, intentionally aided and supported his force for the commission of brutal killings in the name of Islam and defence of United Pakistan. He addressed the freedom fighters as miscreants, agents of India, dogs and traitors.
