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West Bengal police have conducted a manhunt for two Bangladeshis with suspected militant ties.
One of them is believed to be an important member of the banned Islamic group Ansarullah Bangla Team.
Police received information that the two were in a hotel on Kolkata’s Dobson Road last month, according to Bangla-language newspaper Anandabazar.
Tamim who used Moon and Swapan Biswas as alibis was involved in the killing of Bangladeshi bloggers, Kolkata Special Taskforce DC Murlidhar Sharma said. The other suspect has been identified as Saiful, who is believed to be Tamim’s aide.
According to police, militants were involved in the murders of several Bangladeshi bloggers, writers and professors in the past few years.
Investigations after the Gulshan terror attack found that Ansarullah Bangla Team and neo-JMB militants were involved in the killings.
Tamim Chowdhury, a Bangladeshi-Canadian neo-JMB leader, was killed in a law-enforcement raid last year.
Kolkata police say the man they are hunting for hails from Khulna and resided in Satkhira. While checking into the Kolkata hotel, he had identified himself as a resident of North 24 Parganas district in West Bengal.
A reward has been offered for information on Tamim and Saiful, detective police official Murlidhar said.
On Nov 21, Kolkata police said they arrested two Bangladeshi members of Ansarullah Bangla Team, Samsad Mia alias Tushar Biswas alias Tanvir and Riazul Islam alias Riaz alias Suman. An Indian citizen, named Shahadat Hossain, was arrested in Sealdah afterwards, as per report on bdnews24.com.
During questioning, the detainees revealed that Tamim came to India from Bangladesh in 2016 with Tanvir. They stayed at Shahadat’s father-in-law’s house in Hasnabad. They then went to Hyderabad. He was sighted at the hotel on Dobson Road in October.
According to hotel staff, Tamim and his aide checked in on Oct 1 and stayed for three days.
Police detectives say they have confirmed the identities of the suspects through CCTV footage.
Photos released by Kolkata police show Tamim (L) and Saiful (R).