WEB DESK
A Hindu priest has been hacked to death today in Jhenaidah, Khulna Division in the southwestern part of Bangladesh. The victim was identified as Ananda Gopal, 64, a priest of Sri Sri Siddheshwari of the upazila.
Officer-in-charge of Jhenaidah Sadar Police Station Hasan Hafizur Rahman confirmed the incident and said unidentified attackers slaughtered the old Hindu priest at Sonakhali field in the area.
Being informed, police rushed to the spot and recover the body, he added.
Locals found his throat-slit body and informed the police. Police said, the manner of murder bears the hall-mark of previous killings by militants.
The victim, they said, a priest serving in the Noldanga temple for the last several years, had deep hacking wounds on his neck. The brutal killing of a minority member comes just 2 days after the hacking to death in similar manner of a Christian grocer in Natore district in Rajashahi, northwestern Bangladesh on Sunday. Sunday had also seen the brutal killing of the wife of a senior police officer in Chittagong.
The police officer had raided the dens of banned militant outfit, JMB (Jamat-atul Muhjahideen Bangladesh) in the port city. Today’s killing has surprised many as traditionally violence is abhorred during the holy month of Ramadan, which has begun today. Bangladesh, a secular Muslim majority country, has seen a wave of attacks and violent killings by radical Islamist elements since early last year.
Since the beginning of this year, 15 people including members of minority community, free-thinking bloggers, on-line rights activists have been killed by militants this year itself.