88 cases filed, 70 held for communal violence against religious minorities: Bangladesh

Bangladesh’s interim government on Tuesday said that 88 cases have been filed in connection with the communal violence targeting religious minorities in the country between August 5 and October 22, The Daily Star reported.

Seventy persons were arrested in these cases, said Shafiqul Alam, the press secretary to Muhammad Yunus, who is the head of the neighbouring country’s interim government. “All those who commit such violence and heinous acts in Bangladesh will be brought to book,” Alam told reporters.

This came a day after Indian Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri conveyed New Delhi’s concerns about the safety of religious minorities in Bangladesh to Mohammad Jashim Uddin, his counterpart in the country.

Misri visited Dhaka on Monday, marking the first high-level diplomatic meeting between India and Bangladesh after the ouster of former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and her Awami League government on August 5.

An interim government led by Yunus was instated in Bangladesh following the collapse of the Hasina-led government.

Diplomatic relations between New Delhi and Dhaka have been strained since Hasina fled to India, following which incidents of violence against religious minorities were reported in several parts of Bangladesh.

Tensions escalated in the past few weeks after three Hindu monks were arrested on charges of sedition and several Hindu temples came under attack.

On Tuesday, Alam said that the arrests over the violence against religious minorities were not made on the basis of political identities, according to The Daily Star. However, in many of the 88 cases, those who faced violence were members of the previous ruling party, he added.

“How would you evaluate this in the context of whether they were attacked for their faith or as former activists of the ruling party?” he asked.

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