Haji Akhtar Hussain

Malda, Jan. 14: Residents of Kauamari village are yet to believe that the “plain and simple” Haji Akhtar Hussain, a retired army driver, could be associated with Shafiqul, the Lashkar-e-Toiba operative who was arrested from his house on Monday night.

The Congress gram panchayat member from Harishchandrapur, Sakir Hossain, said Haji Akhtar, after retiring from the army in 1992, went for Haj in 1995. “A person who completes Haj cannot be bad. We have never noticed anything of the kind in him.”

Haji Akhtar always stood by people during times of need. “If anyone fell seriously ill, he would arrange for a vehicle to take the person to hospital. We always ran to him whenever we planned to hold a cultural programme in the village. We are really stunned that police arrested such a plain and simple person,” said the gram panchayat member.

Local CPM leader Mujibur Rehman echoed the gram panchayat member. “When I came to know that the police had come to Haji Akhtar’s house, I rushed there. I asked the police why he was being taken away. They said he was wanted for questioning and would be released soon,” Rehman said.

He said he was present during the wedding on Monday and when the groom left with the bride around 6pm. Five hours later, the CID team surrounded Haji’s house and arrested Shafiqul.

“Haji’s eldest daughter Afroza is off to her husband’s home, but her in-laws and relatives are raising eyebrows,” Rehman said. Afroza was married to a fruit trader in Harka village, 5km away.

Anwara Bibi is distraught and scared. “I don’t know what my husband did that the police had to arrest him. He should not have brought Shafiqul home,” she said.

Haji Akhtar was taken for questioning around 11pm on Monday and released yesterday morning. He was again summoned to the Harishchandrapur police station in the evening, where he was first questioned and then arrested for sheltering a militant. “I came to know that he has been taken to Murshidabad. I do not know when he will return home to me and my three unmarried daughters,” Anwara said.

Even though, the villagers were all praise for Haji Akhtar, very few actually visited his wife and daughters after the arrest.

“We are scared to go the house, although our sympathies are with them. Who knows what yarn the police might spin and put us into trouble,” a villager said.