The ongoing visit to Bangladesh by Ibtisam Elahi Zahir, general secretary of Pakistan’s Markazi Jamiat Ahle Hadith and a close aide of Jamaat-ud-Dawa chief Hafiz Saeed, has raised concerns about efforts to encourage radical ideas in a country that has long nurtured secularism and pluralism, according to Bangladesh watchers.
Zahir arrived in Bangladesh last week and began touring areas along the India-Bangladesh border, ET has learnt. This is Zahir’s second visit to Bangladesh after the interim government led by Muhammad Yunus came to power in August last year.
Zahir has been in close contact with Abdur Rahim bin Abdur Razzak, the son of Bangladesh Ahle Hadith leader Sheikh Abdur Razzak bin Yusuf.
Zakir is learnt to have delivered speeches at mosques along the border areas including Rajshahi and held a meeting with Ahle Hadith Andolan Bangladesh chairman Asadullah Al Ghalib in the city. His schedule includes visits to several other areas along the Bangladesh-India border and he even plans to address a conference of Salafists.
Apprehensions are growing in the Indian security establishment about the revival of terror cells in Bangladesh reminiscent of the 2001-06 period. Several terror attacks in India’s heartland had links in terror network in Dhaka under ISI’s patronage and with support of the Bangladesh Jamaat-e-Islami. The period also saw rebels in India’s Northeast, especially Bangladesh-based ULFA leaders, working closely with the ISI and certain ministers of the then BNP-Jamaat-e-Islami government. The Pakistani spy agency has allegedly nurtured each of the radical and extremist organisations in both Pakistan and Bangladesh.Zahir has been under watch in the UK for his inflammatory speeches. There are reports that the UK Charity Commission in the past brought Zakir under probe and there have been demands to ban him from entering the country.