FROM PAGE 12

not communicate with the honourable member of parliament before filing this case.

“I acted on my own because I felt bad. The whole Patharghata area is being portrayed falsely on Facebook over a minor incident every day. It has created unrest in the locality.”

Asked about the legality of the case, Md Dawud Hossain, officer-in-charge of Gulshan Police Station, said, “It seemed cognisable to me, so I took the case … . The court will give directions if any law was violated in filing the case.”

A team of the Detective Branch of Dhaka Metropolitan Police picked up Hasan Nasim from his house in the city’s Agargaon area around 8:00pm on Friday.

Yesterday, he was produced before the court with a seven-day remand prayer after being shown arrested in the case.

Later, Dhaka Metropolitan Magistrate Md Hasib Ullah Pias rejected the remand prayer and sent Hasan to jail, according to a sub-inspector working at the court.

The court also fixed today (April 19) for the hearing of the bail petition, the SI added.

According to the police forwarding report, detectives arrested him after finding his involvement during investigation.

In the case statement, the complainant said that on April 11, he saw a Facebook post on “Patharghata.com”, which said, “Three whales were brought from the sea, two sharks are on the way, Inshallah -- everyone’s invited: Chief Whip”.

Chief Whip Moni had, in fact, said these lines in parliament on April 10.

Meanwhile, the case statement further said that multiple screenshots of different posts were sent, with “an intent to blackmail”, to the chief whip’s WhatsApp number from an unknown number.

Complainant Nazrul also claimed that the same account had repeatedly published and circulated misleading information at different times. He said he later informed Moni about the matter.

Contacted, Moni said that five to seven Facebook pages had been consistently spreading propaganda since December last year. At that time, they filed general diaries with three police stations and also lodged a complaint with the returning officer. Based on that complaint, the cyber police informed him that they had tracked down the individual on Friday night.

NCP STATEMENT

The National Citizen Party, in a statement signed by its Joint Member Secretary (Office) Saleh Uddin Sifat and issued yesterday, has condemned the arrest of Nasim.

Questioning the charges, the party noted that while section 25 of the ordinance defines “blackmailing” as threatening someone to extract illegal benefits, the First Information Report lacks any description of what benefits or actions were demanded.

The NCP also highlighted the government’s contradictory stance on free speech, recalling that Prime Minister Tarique Rahman shared a caricature of himself on August 11, 2024, celebrating the restoration of political cartoons in Bangladesh.

“But just two months into his government’s tenure, an activist has lost the freedom to share cartoons and has been sent to jail in a bailable case,” the statement read.

Calling the case baseless, the NCP accused law enforcers of extreme unprofessionalism for “illegally arresting” a citizen, and demanded an immediate explanation from the government along with Nasim’s unconditional release.