Sahara vows to bring Gulshan Ave home grabbers 'to book'

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Sahara vows to bring Gulshan Ave home grabbers 'to book'

Sahara Khatun, the home minister, has promised to bring to book those behind the assault on an octogenarian couple on the capital's Gulshan Avenue during a night time bid last week to dislodge them from their home of nearly 40 years.

The minister visited the couple for an hour and a quarter on Saturday night. "This is a democratic government; we won't allow such actions," she told reporters emerging from the house.

Over a dozen intruders, claiming they were from private TV station ATN Bangla, broke into the home of retired civil servant Abdul Qaiyum at around 1:30am on Wednesday and tried to forcibly evict his family from their decades-old home.

Sahara said the elderly couple were still visibly shaken on Saturday night. "We are on the side of truth," the minister added. "The home minister has assured us that the guilty will be brought to justice," said a family member.

The armed intruders, planting a signboard bearing the TV station's name, overpowered the house guards on the night, but were chased down by neighbours' security men. Eleven of them were arrested, taken to court and sent to jail on Wednesday.

Saiful Bari, a spokesperson for ATN Bangla, said on the day that the company's chairman Mahfuzur Rahman had purchased the property, at 69 Gulshan Avenue, from a man named Abdur Rashid Khan in March.

"But no one from ATN Bangla tried to illegally grab the house; those who did so are not associated with ATN Bangla," Bari told the media. He also said the signboard seized by police, with ATN Bangla's name, was not theirs.

According to a document shown by Bari, Mahfuzur Rahman bought the 21-katha plot for Tk 2.25 crore. The current market price for just one katha of land in upscale Gulshan, however, costs nearly Tk 2 crore.

A RAJUK official told on Thursday that ATN Bangla's claims of owning the land at 69 Gulshan Avenue have no legal basis. Mostafa Jamil Khan, assistant director of city development authority RAJUK, said the channel's chairman had bought the 21-katha plot from a fake owner.

Abdur Rashid Khan did not own the plot, he said. "He was hanging around in the office with fake lease papers. He came to us. But after scrutinising the papers it was found that his papers were false," said the RAJUK official.

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