3 held for attack on Sufi Muslims

Three persons were arrested on Monday for their involvement in an attack on three elderly Sufi Muslims, including two women, and critically injuring them in western Bangladesh’s border town with India.

Eight to 10 assailants attacked several, “Bauls (mystic singers)” around midnight Sunday with sharp weapons, iron rods and bamboo sticks at their “Akhra (residing place)” at Ektarpur village in Chadanga district, some 240 km from here.

According to one of the victims Bulu Begum, the men barged into the Akhra (place where Bauls stay) and started beating them with iron rods. All the three injured are in critical state. The Akhra’s owner Shahidul Islam filed a case against seven to eight unidentified men with the police on Sunday night, said local police O.C. Humayaun Kabir, Bdnews24 reported. He said police arrested three persons the same night.

They accused have been identified as Ariful Islam, 22, Shahed Ali, 30 and Jamat Ali, 40. The Baul community renders mystic songs disseminating messages of universal harmony, which is close to the Muslim Sufi thoughts, and do not perform the routine Islamic rituals.

An investigation is on into the incident, which comes over two months after a 65-year-old Muslim Sufi preacher was hacked to death in central Bangladesh, in an attack that bore the hallmark of previous murders of intellectuals, bloggers and minorities by Islamists in the country. Bangladesh in the past two years has witnessed deadly attacks on liberal and secular writers and activists, religious minorities, including Hindus and moderate Sufis and Shias.