We do not know what to make of the news regarding the police's identifying the person who has recently sent a death threat to Professor Annisuzzaman via text message. We found a glimmer of hope in the declaration by the IGP that the culprit had been identified, only to be dashed by his admission that the suspect he described as a 'fundamentalist', had not been arrested yet. It is beyond comprehension why, after identifying the culprit who had cloned the original number of the phone and sent the death threat, the police are not nabbing him. What are they waiting for? Announcing publicly that the real culprit has been identified without catching him will alert him and his accomplices.

More than a hundred individuals have received death threats over the last three years according to police sources. The latest ones are against eminent persons such as Professor Anisuzzaman and writer Hasan Azizul Haque. These death threats must be taken seriously and any possible leads have to be followed through promptly. We have seen, as in the case of some bloggers and publishers, how such threats have been carried out. Wasting precious time before nabbing a suspect is unacceptable in the wake of so many killings. 

Considering the havoc already wreaked by terrorists at home and abroad, we cannot afford to be lethargic in apprehending possible terrorists. This demands police protection for individuals who have received death threats and prompt action in the form of arrests, after the identities of suspects have been established during investigation. The crime of cloning mobile phone numbers must be stopped immediately as a part of such anti-terror efforts.