Pir throws a cobweb of lawsuits to get land from man
Ekramul Ahsan Kanchan faces as many as 14 cases filed in and outside Dhaka and they charge him with every possible crime from human trafficking to attempt to murder and from robbery to violence against women.
Most of the plaintiffs, witnesses and the apparent victims of the crimes are linked to a pir in the capital's Rajarbagh and the place of congregation of his and his disciples in the area, revealed an investigation by the Criminal Investigation Department.
The pile of fake cases against Ekramul, a resident of Shantibag, was even higher before the court dismissed 35 other cases accusing him of similar charges. One case was filed under the Explosive Substances Act.
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What is not visible in the harassment of Ekramul is the pressure mounted on him by pir Dillur Rahman and his followers to hand over his share of his family's ancestral land at the back of pir's Rajarbagh Darbar.
Ekramul's elder brother, mother and a sister became followers of the pir after his father's death in 1995, but Ekramul and his other brother refused to join the clan.
The three disciples of pir Dillur from Ekramul's family donated their shares of the 3-decimal land and the 3-storey building on it to the Darbar.
Failing to get the remaining shares, the pir and his followers filed cases from across the country, said the CID probe report.
Receiving the report on Sunday, the High Court bench of Justice M Enayetur Rahim and Justice Md Mostafizur Rahman said, "When one case can ruin a person's life, so many cases have been filed against a man. This is a serious matter."
Earlier, entangled in a series of 49 cases, Ekramul filed a writ petition with the HC, pleading with it to order a probe to identify the people behind the lawsuits. The HC then asked the CID to look into the matter and file a report in 60 days
Then some of the complainants of the cases filed appeals against the HC order and the Appellate Division stayed the order.
The HC upon receiving the CID report on Sunday suspended the hearing on the matter for a week to see the order of the Appellate Division.
