Ahmadiyya Muslim Jamaat, Bangladesh (AMJB) yesterday appealed to the government to protect its mosques and complexes across the country, as religious bigots threatened to capture three mosques in Dhaka, Narayanganj and Brahmanbaria tomorrow.
It also urged the government to free four of their mosques in Brahmanbaria from anti-Ahmadiyya captors.
The AMJB leaders reiterated their demand of rescinding a ban on the Ahmadiyya publications, which they said, encouraged the bigots to mount torture on the Ahmadiyya community across the country.
"Return us the mosques we built with our hard-earned money and let us practice our religion in peace," Abdul Awal Khan Chowdhury, Ahmadiyya missionary, pleaded at a press conference in Dhaka yesterday.
"We've already gone through a lot of torture, please stop it now," said the Ahmadiyya leader and alleged that two constituents of the ruling coalition are patronising and taking active part in the persecution of the Ahmadiyyas.
The AMJB leaders pointed out that they cannot refute the bigots' propaganda and false accusations against the Ahmadiyyas because of the ban on their publications.
International Khatme Nabuwat Movement, one of the several anti-Ahmadiyya groups, has announced to capture Ahmadiyya mosque in Tejgaon's Nakhalpara after the Juma prayers today.
Operatives of International Tahaffuz-e-Khatme Nabuwat Committee Bangladesh, who razed a mosque, vandalised houses of and injured 11 Ahmadiyyas at Bhadughar in Brahmanbaria last Friday, threatened to burn the Ahmadiyyas should they gather to say their prayers at the mosque tomorrow.
Fanatics of Khatme Nabuwat Committee Bangladesh and Aamra Dhakabashi, who failed to capture Narayanganj Missionpara Ahmadiyya Mosque in the wake of strong police watch and civil society resistance on October 8, have been learnt to have prepared to make another attempt on either tomorrow or last Friday of Ramadan.
Encouraged by their success in pulling down signboards of three Ahmadiyya mosques in Chittagong, Khulna and Patuakhali, the anti-Ahmadiyya zealots planned to hang news signboards at Nakhalpara, Narayanganj and Brahmanbaria mosque, branding the mosques as 'Kadiani (Ahmadiyya) Place of Worship'. They cautioned people against getting deceived by saying prayers there.
Hailing from Brahmanbaria since 1912, the Ahmadiyyas follow the same rituals as the Sunnis, apart from their belief that Imam Mahdi, the last messenger of Prophet Mohammed, has already arrived to uphold Islam as it was preached 1400 years ago. The Sunnis believe Mahdi has not arrived as yet.
The anti-Ahmadiyya capmpaign gathered momentum across the country after mid-2003 with an attempt to capture Nakhalpara mosque on November 20 last year and the Islami Oikya Jote (Islamic Alliance) of ruling coalition government is alleged to be tacitly supporting it.