Juba Dal leader assaults woman in Noakhali

A local Jubo Dal leader allegedly assaulted a woman in public in Noakhali’s Subarnachar upazila.

The incident took place around 11:00am on Saturday (13 June) in Mohammadpur Union.

A video of the assault has since circulated on social media.

The accused, Md Shafiq (38), is a former general secretary of a ward unit of Jubo Dal in Mohammadpur Union.

According to the victim, her husband works at Shafik’s fish farm. She alleged that the Jubo Dal leader had withheld her husband’s wages for the past two months.

As a result, the family struggled financially during Eid-ul-Azha. Her husband subsequently stopped working at the farm, which reportedly infuriated the Juba Dal leader.

The woman said her husband had set up a fishing net in a nearby river on Saturday morning. When Shafiq allegedly tried to take away the net, they protested. At that point, Shafiq reportedly beat her husband with a plastic pipe reinforced with an iron rod.

She further alleged that around 11:00am, Shafiq returned with his brother-in-law, Nur-e-Mawla and again assaulted her husband. When she intervened to protect him, she too was beaten.

The woman also alleged that Shafiq is involved in yaba trafficking through his fish farm. The allegation could not be independently verified.

Despite repeated attempts to contact the accused Juba Dal leader, Md Shafiq, over his mobile phone, he did not respond. However, Shafiq reportedly denied the assault allegations while speaking to a local media worker.

He claimed that he had a family relationship with the woman’s family and alleged that her husband had stolen fish from his farm a few days earlier. According to Shafiq, the woman and her husband attacked him while he was returning with a fishing net on Saturday morning, leaving him with a broken nose.

Asked about the incident, Mohammad Lutfur Rahman, officer-in-charge (OC) of Char Jabbar Police Station, told Prothom Alo that no written complaint had yet been filed.

However, after seeing the video circulating on social media, police had already been sent to the area to locate and arrest the accused.

He said legal action would be taken following an investigation if a formal complaint is lodged.