by Staff CorrespondentDhaka– At least two people were killed and many others injured in clashes between rival groups of devotees over capturing the control of one of the World’s largest annual Muslim congregation site near the Bangladeshi capital Dhaka, police said on Wednesday.
The three-day first phase congregation known as Biswa Ijtema is scheduled this time for January 31-February 2 to be followed by the final phase between February 7 and February 9.
International Tabligh Jamaat organizes the congregation focusing on exhorting Muslims to be more religiously observant and returning to religious practices as per Prophet Muhammad’s teaching.
Wednesdays clashes erupted well before the daybreak as a group, known loyal to Bangladeshi scholar Moulana Jubaer Ahmed, tried to prevent supporters of Indian Muslim scholar Muhammad Saad Kandhalvi from entering the Ijtema ground, Officer Habibu Iskander said according to witnesses’ accounts.
A pre-Ijtema gathering was arranged at the congregation site,.
Armed with sticks and brick chips, the rival groups of devotees clashed each other for nearly 30 minutes before the lawmen intervened.
Two people were killed and nearly 40 wounded, he said.
In the recent years, the congregation organisers have been divided into two fractions as the group led by Jubaer Ahmed accuses Saad Kandhalvi, the great grandson of Muhammad Ilyas Kandhlawi who founded the International Tabligh movement, of misinterpreting Islam.
Every year, tens of thousands of Muslims from around the world converge at the Ijteam ground in Tongi, 30 kilometers north of the Bangladeshi capital Dhaka, to seek blessings at the religion’s third-largest annual event.
@newsnextbd.com/Bangladesh Muslim congregation clashes
