Sacked minister Abdul Latif Siddique, who had been staying in India for about one and a half months, returned to Bangladesh last night, with several arrest warrants on him. The former posts and telecommunication minister, who has been under fire for his anti-hajj comments in September, arrived at Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport on Air India flight AI 230 around 8:20pm. He stayed at the VIP
terminal for a while and talked to some airport and government agency officials, according to airport sources. He left the airport through the domestic terminal around 9:00pm, boarded his personal vehicle waiting outside and headed towards Uttara, the sources said. None could say where he went. Airport police officials, seeking anonymity, said Latif was not arrested there as they did not have orders from "higher authorities". A senior journalist of Bangladesh, who travelled in the same flight, said he saw Latif in the business class. Advertisement Once the news of Latif's arrival in Dhaka was confirmed, The Daily Star contacted State Minister for Home Asaduzzaman Khan Kamal to know whether Latif would be arrested. Interestingly, like the airport police, the home affairs boss too said he didn't have any instruction in this regard. "Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina was surprised to hear about Latif's return. She also expressed her anger at this," he said over the phone at 11:00pm. "The prime minister knows nothing about why and how he [Latif] returned," Khan added. According to sources, the premier came to know about Latif's return through one of her personal staff after she returned to Gono Bhaban from the parliament. Latif was removed from Sheikh Hasina's cabinet and from the Awami League's presidium, the highest policy-making forum of the party, on October 12 following his derogatory comments on hajj and Tablighi Jamaat at a programme in New York on September 28. His remarks triggered a whirlwind of criticisms at home and abroad. On October 24, his primary membership in the AL was cancelled too, marking an end to Latif's five-decade-long association with the party. A total of 22 cases were filed against him in 18 districts for offending the religious sentiments of the Muslims. Several arrest warrants have been issued in those cases. From the USA, Latif went to India October 12 and had been staying in Kolkata since then. HEFAJAT'S THREAT Hefajat-e-Islam demanded Latif Siddique's arrest and death penalty. Otherwise, it would go for tough programmes like Dhaka siege and nonstop hartals. The Islamist organisation, which went on the rampage in the capital in May last year, announced this in a statement by its chief Shah Ahmed Shafi and secretary general Junayed Babunagori last night. 'LATIF ON HIS OWN' Neither the ruling party nor the government would take the responsibility for what Latif did, said AL Joint General Secretary Mahbubul Alam Hanif. “He is now on his own since he is no more in the government or the Awami League,” he told The Daily Star last night. Latif Siddique is the first AL central committee member to have lost party membership since Sheikh Hasina took the reins of the AL in 1981. Also, he is the first to have been sacked from the cabinet since parliamentary democracy was restored in the country in 1991 and the second in the history of Bangladesh. In 1980, president Ziaur Rahman removed Moudud Ahmed, now a BNP standing committee member, from the cabinet. WHAT LATIF ACTUALLY SAID At the September 28 programme in the USA, Latif said, “During Hajj, so much manpower is wasted. More than 20 lakh people have gone to Saudi Arabia to perform Hajj. They have no work, no production and are offering only deduction.” He added some 20 lakh Tablighi Jamaat people get together annually. They do not do any work, except for halting traffic movement in the whole country. He also reportedly made critical comments about Sajeeb Wazed Joy, the prime minister's son. When the AL served a show-cause notice asking Latif to explain why he wouldn't be expelled from the party permanently for acting against the party charter, Latif, in reply, defended himself saying the AL dropped the word "Muslim" from its name in 1955 to give the party a secular character. Moreover, the party ensured freedom of speech and expression through its constitution. And so, he can express his feelings about any issue. Latif, however, regretted that AL leaders got into "an embarrassing situation" for what he had said. But the ruling party found his reply unsatisfactory and expelled him.
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