Secular activist and law student who was critical of radical Islamists hacked to death in Bangladesh

28 year old Bangladeshi law student and outspoken atheist Nazimuddin Samad was brutally killed in Dhaka on Wednesday, April 6 by attackers wielding machetes, the latest in a series of attacks on secular bloggers and activists in the Muslim majority country.

Syed Nurul Islam, deputy commissioner of Dhaka Metropolitan Police to AFP said :
“They hacked his head with a machete. As he fell down, one of them shot him in the head with a pistol from close range. He died on the spot,”
The master’s student of the state-run Jagannath University’s Law Department, who was critical of radical Islamists was killed by suspected Islamist militants in Old Dhaka’s Sutrapur area.

He was attacked by three assailants while walking to his home in Gendaria with another youth after completing classes at the university, near Bahadur Shah Park.
While murdering Samad, the killers shouted Allahu Akbar (God is Greatest), witnesses said. The youth accompanying the victim has been missing since the incident, a police official said.

Nazim, who hailed from Sylhet, was the information and research secretary of Sylhet district unit of Bangabandhu Jatiya Jubo Parishad. He was also an activist of Gonojagoron Moncho’s Sylhet wing.

His friends said Nazim used to campaign for secularism on Facebook and was critical of radical Islamists. A day before the murder, he expressed concerns over the country’s law and order in a Facebook post.

The police cordoned off the crime scene. They recovered a bullet shell from the spot.
Nurul Amin, Assistant Commissioner of Sutrapur division, was quoted as saying that the police went to the spot and found the body in a pool of blood.

Nurul said it was clear that the assailants kept an eye on Nazim’s activities for long.
University Proctor Nur Mohammad said Nazim got admitted to the university two months ago.
“We have informed his family about the murder and are taking detailed information about him,” he said.