Deported, man remains missing

Golam Rabbani

A Bangladeshi citizen who along with his family went to Malaysia last year has remained missing since July 19 after Malaysian immigration police deported him for his suspected links with militancy.

Nazia Ferdousi, wife of Golam Rabbani, quoting Malaysian officials said Bangladesh authorities had asked for his deportation. However, there has been no official statement in Dhaka in this regard.

Nazia said Rabbani was never involved in militancy, but Malaysian authorities told her that Bangladesh police got “some information” relating to his “terror activities”.

Nazia, who is still in Malaysia with her three children, told The Daily Star recently over the phone that her husband last called her from the cell phone of a co-passenger on a Malindo Airlines flight around 10:00pm Malaysian time (8:00pm Bangladesh time), minutes before the plane took off on July 19.

But he neither reached his home in Bogra nor contacted her. “My husband promised me to call again after landing in Dhaka whenever he gets the chance.”

Last month, Rabbani's elder sister Nigar Sultana told this newspaper that her brother called her that night and only said he was coming back.

Contacted again yesterday, Nigar said there is still no trace of Rabbani.

According to Nazia, the family went to Malaysia on September 3 last year as her husband planned to complete his master's degree from a university there. They also wanted to ensure better education of their children.

She said they went there on tourist visas and later got their eldest son, eight-year-old Hossain al Jawad, admitted to a madrasa in Gombak area of Kuala Lumpur.

As Jawad became a student of a local educational institution, the authorities extended his visa till 2019. Rabbani also got his visa extended for the same period, she added.

Nazia returned to Bangladesh on November 1 with her two children and after a few months, they again went back to Malaysia.

Rabbani applied for admission to International Islamic University Malaysia and the university issued an offer letter.

They, however, asked him to surrender his dependant visa and get a student visa. The family visa is also called dependant visa in Malaysia.

When the couple went to the immigration office on July 3 for his student visa, police asked him to come next day.

He went there the next day, this time without his wife, and got detained. Handcuffed, he was also taken to his residence in a police vehicle, said Nazia.

According to Nazia, Rabbani used to run a coaching centre for school students in Bogra town while he was studying honours in political science at Government Azizul Haque College.

Nazia also got admitted to applied chemistry and chemical engineering in Islamic University, Kushtia, but could not continue as she gave birth to her first child while in second year.

“My husband even planned to go to Saudi Arabia for better education of our children, but I requested him to drop the plan as it required a huge amount of money,” she said.

Madrasa education is very good in Malaysia, she added.

On April 23 this year, when she was in Bangladesh, a man identifying himself as a Detective Branch official went to their Bogra home and enquired about her husband.

“We gave them all information as Rabbani was not involved in any criminal or militant activities,” she told The Daily Star.

Noor-E-Azam, officer-in-charge of Airport Police Station, said he is not aware of any such deportation. Nobody filed a general diary or a case about his going missing.

“Usually, we are not informed if anyone is deported,” he added. 

An official at the Police Headquarters admitted that Rabbani was deported. He, however, could not say if any agency picked him up from Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport.