A truck collided with a vehicle in the convoy of Hasnat Abdullah, convener of the Anti-Discrimination Student Movement, and Sarjis Alam, general secretary of the July Martyrs Memorial Foundation, in Lohagara, Chattogram. The vehicle was damaged in the accident, but fortunately, no one was injured.
The incident took place on Wednesday (Nov 27), at around 7:30 pm, near the Chunti Haji Road junction on the Lohagara upazila stretch of the Ctg-Cox's highway.
Police and witnesses reported that Hasnat and Sargis were returning from the Chunti Faranga area in Chattogram, where the ancestral home of the late lawyer Saiful Islam is located. Their convoy included several motorcycles, two cars, and a Pajero.
The Chunti Haji Road junction, located 12 kilometers west of Saiful's village, is where the vehicles were transitioning from a rural road to the highway. Initially, the motorcycles and the Pajero vehicle, with Hasnat and Sarjis aboard, entered the highway. Shortly thereafter, as a private car was merging onto the highway, a truck, traveling towards Chattogram, collided with the front of the car. The impact damaged the left front side of the vehicle. Several of Hasnat and Sarjis's companions were in the damaged car at the time.
After the accident, when the truck driver tried to flee, but the motorcyclists in the convoy pursued him and apprehended both the driver and his assistant. They were then handed over to the Lohagara police.
Following this, Hasnat and Sarjis filed a General Diary (GD) at the Lohagara police station and, along with their companions, departed for Dhaka. According to Umama Fatema, spokesperson for the Anti-Discrimination Student Movement, the vehicle damaged in the collision was carrying the coordinators from Chattogram.
In a Facebook post about the incident, Abdul Hannan Masud, the chief organizer of the Anti-Discrimination Student Movement, wrote: "While returning from visiting the grave of the late lawyer Saiful Islam Alif, at around 7:30 pm on Wednesday, a truck deliberately rammed the vehicle convoy of Hasnat Abdullah, convener of the Anti-Discrimination Student Movement, and Sarjis Alam at the Chunti Union Haji Road junction on the Ctg-Cox's highway, in an apparent attempt to kill them. Initial investigations reveal that the driver claimed to have unloaded goods in Cox’s Bazar after coming from Mymensingh, but no evidence of such unloading has been found. There is a history of Indian intelligence agency 'RAW' being implicated in the assassination of prominent figures in Bangladesh."
Abdul Aleem, the on-duty police officer at Lohagara police station, informed the media that the truck driver, Mojibur Rahman (40), from Trishal upazila in Mymensingh, and his son, Rifat Mia (18), are currently being interrogated at the police station. Both the truck and the private car involved in the accident are under police custody.
Further legal action will be taken based on the results of the ongoing investigation.
Bd-Pratidin English/ARK
