A suspended senior Bangladeshi police officer, Mohammad Arifuzzaman, was caught by India’s Border Security Force (BSF) on the evening of August 23 while attempting to illegally cross the border into India through North 24 Parganas in West Bengal.
Arifuzzaman had been missing from duty for months and reportedly went into hiding after Nobel Laureate Mohammad Yusuf formed an interim government following the collapse of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s regime in Bangladesh in August last year.
Mohammad Arifuzzaman, currently serving as the Assistant Superintendent of Police with the Armed Police Battalion-2 in Muktagacha, Mymensingh, was previously the Assistant Commissioner of Police in the Rangpur Metropolitan Police. He was recently suspended by Bangladesh’s Ministry of Home Affairs for being absent from duty without official permission since October 14 last year.
Mohammad Arifuzzaman was apprehended by troops of the BSF’s 143 Battalion between 6 and 7 pm on August 24 while attempting to illegally cross into India through Bithari, under the Hakimpur border outpost in Swarupnagar, Basirhat. Taking advantage of the monsoon rain, he tried to infiltrate undetected but was caught and handed over to Swarupnagar Police Station. He was arrested under the Foreigners Act, and authorities recovered several documents from him, including his service ID.
During interrogation, Mohammad Arifuzzaman revealed that he is a resident of Sahipara in Nilphamari district, under the Rangpur division. He told police that he had been hiding in Satkhira district for nearly seven months to save his life. On August 24, he was produced before the Basirhat Court, which remanded him to 14 days in judicial custody. Indian authorities have informed their Bangladeshi counterparts about the arrest.
