From robber to terrorist

They all were dacoits by profession.

Once the five men were arrested and sent to jail, but a jailed leader of banned militant outfit Harkat-ul-Jihad Bangladesh (HujiB) recruited them as members of the outfit.

After coming out of jail on bail, they formed a separate group under the leadership of another HujiB leader and got involved in mugging and dacoity. Their purposes were spending most the collected fund to strengthen the outfit by recruiting new members and freeing leaders from jail on bail.

An investigation team of the Counter Terrorism and Transnational Crime (CTTC) revealed this after picking up six members of the outfit from the capital’s Badda area on Thursday night. The arrestees include the five.

The arrestees are Md Billal Hossain, 25, Nur Alam, 28, Rafiqul Islam, 29, Abul Miah, 35, Abdur Rahman, 30, and Akter Hossain, 34.

Billal is the leader of the dacoity group of the HujiB.

CTTC chief Monirul Islam said their team also recovered a bottle of chloroform, a machete, three knives, two masks and a toy pistol from their possession.

During primary interrogation, the arrestees admitted that they used to commit robbery to collect fund for the outfit as per instructions of their leader Md Ujjal alias Ratan, Monirul told reporters at Maulana Bhashani Hockey Stadium in the capital’s Gulistan yesterday.

Ujjal was convicted by a court in the August 21 grenade attack case. He is now in Kashimpur High Security Jail.

Monirul also said Billal formed the seven-member group after 12 other HujiB members, who were also involved in collecting fund by committing dacoity, were arrested by police on March 4.

The counterterrorism official was talking to journalists during the break of a friendly cricket match between CTTC and Crime Reporters’ Association Bangladesh.

Yesterday, a case was filed against the six arrestees and two absconding members of the group with Badda police station.

The CTTC chief said they were conducting drives to arrest the two.

Another top CTTC official, who is involved in the investigation, said the arrestees were members of an inter-district dacoity group. Their only objective was to commit mugging and dacoity.

“But they got in touch with the HujiB leaders in jail,” said the official, requesting anonymity.

The HujiB leaders convinced them that it would not be a sin if they spent a portion of the collected money for the welfare of the religion after meeting their needs, the official said, quoting the arrestees as saying during primary interrogation.

Yesterday, a Dhaka court placed the six arrestees on five-day remand each after the law enforcers produced them before it seeking 10-day remand each, said SK Imran Hossain, assistant commissioner of CTTC unit.