At least 1,500 police members ranking from constable to superintendent from various places of the country have recently been transferred to Cox’s Bazar.
The transfers were made in past weeks to overhaul the existing police setup of the district following the killing of retired army major Sinha Mohammad Rashed Khan in the district on July 31.
On Thursday, the police headquarters also transferred 34 police inspectors to different ranges and metropolitan units just two days after it transferred 29 others to Cox’s Bazar on Monday, according to separate office orders issued by additional inspector general of police Md Mainur Rahman Chowdhury.
On Monday, the government also transferred 10 officials ranking additional police superintendent and assistant police superintendent from Cox’s Bazar and other officials from various units.
Police HQ assistant inspector general (administration) Masudur Rahman told New Age that all the police members in the Cox’s Bazar district were under the process of being replaced with officials and rankers from across the country.
On September 16, the home ministry transferred Cox’s Bazar police superintendent ABM Masud Hossain to Rajshahi, a week after a court had rejected a plea to include him as a suspect in the Sinha killing case.
Masud left Cox’s Bazar on Thursday.
A senior police official at the police headquarters said that they deployed about 200 sub-inspectors and about 200 assistant sub-inspectors to Cox’s Bazar along with 1,000 constables and 45 nayeks.
‘We have vetted the police members from different districts and deployed them there to replace the old set up,’ said the official.
The immediate-past Cox’s Bazar police superintendent, Masud, was made Rajshahi superintendent of police.
On September 10, Cox’s Bazar senior judicial magistrate Tamanna Farah rejected the application filed by Sinha’s sister Sharmin Sharia Ferdous seeking the inclusion of Masud in the case she had filed following the killing of Sinha in police firing.
Sinha, 36, who took early retirement from the Bangladesh Army in November 2018, was shot dead at a police checkpoint on Cox’s Bazar–Teknaf Marine Drive at Shamlapur under Teknaf upazila in Cox’s Bazar on July 31.
Sinha’s sister filed a murder case with the judicial magistrate court in Cox’s Bazar on August 5 accusing nine police personnel.
RAB investigators have so far arrested 14 people, including 11 police personnel, in connection with the case.
