Toufiq Sheikh’s absentee funeral prayer, organised in memory of a garment worker who died after being attacked during wage protests, was disrupted on Wednesday when law enforcement personnel fired sound grenades to disperse the gathering at Chandana Chowrasta in Gazipur. The National Citizen Party (NCP), which had announced the programme, alleged that around 20 people were injured, according to reports by Dhaka Tribune and The Daily Star.
How Toufiq Sheikhs Absentee Funeral Prayer Was Halted
The gayebana janaza, as such prayers are known in Bangladesh, was held at Chandana Chowrasta on the Dhaka-Mymensingh highway under the banner of “Workers-Students-People,” organised by NCP and Sramik Shakti leaders, The Daily Star reported. Dhaka Tribune said that when party leaders and activists tried to proceed despite police objections, officers from the police and the Border Guard Bangladesh fired sound grenades and dispersed the crowd.
The Daily Star’s correspondent at the scene gave a slightly different sequence. According to that account, police arrived towards the end of the programme and asked the organisers to clear the road, after which an altercation followed, with pushing and shoving, as leaders urged officers to allow the prayer to be completed. At least four sound grenades were fired.
NCP central leader Ali Nasher Khan, whose name is transliterated differently across outlets, alleged that police beat activists with batons and fired the grenades, injuring at least 20 people. “We were attacked and prevented from holding the absentee funeral prayer,” he was quoted as saying, while demanding justice for the death of the worker. Police have not been quoted in the available reports as confirming the number of injuries.
Who Was Toufiq Sheikh
Toufiq Sheikh worked in the cutting section of a garment factory in the Banglabazar area of Gazipur and had lived there for about five years. Dhaka Tribune described him as 22 years old, although some other outlets reported his age as 21. He was the son of Tabibor Rahman Tabi of Chhaygharia village in Kochasahar Union, Gobindaganj Upazila, Gaibandha, and his family said he had moved to the city after his father’s death to help support them.
He died on Tuesday at Shin Shin Japan Hospital in Uttara, Dhaka, where he had been receiving treatment. His body reached his village at about 10pm that night, and his funeral prayer was scheduled for 9:30am on Wednesday, followed by burial at the village graveyard.
Conflicting Accounts of the Attack
How Toufiq came to be injured remains disputed. According to his family and eyewitnesses cited by several outlets, he was recording the unrest on his mobile phone on Monday when a group attacked and beat him. A friend who was with him told the media that he was assaulted by people hired by a garment factory.
Police have offered a different explanation. Gazipur Metropolitan Police Additional Commissioner Belayet Hossain said Toufiq had been taking photographs and videos of vandalism by protesters when he was attacked. Another police official said outsiders had pressured the factory to shut down, triggering a clash with workers. Police are collecting CCTV footage from the area as part of their investigation, and seven people were shown arrested in a related case, according to one report. As the competing versions suggest, the circumstances of his death have yet to be established.
The Wider Minimum Wage Protests
The death occurred amid escalating protests by garment workers demanding that the monthly minimum wage be raised from Tk12,500 to Tk30,000. Workers in Gazipur, Savar, Ashulia, Narayanganj and Mirpur have taken part in the demonstrations, which have led to clashes, disrupted production and forced some factories to suspend operations. Police deployed additional personnel and water cannons in Mirpur and Uttara as the unrest continued.
On Wednesday, most factories in Gazipur reopened as workers returned under tight security, although tension flared in the Noljani area, where workers tried to block the Dhaka-Gazipur road and law enforcement fired tear gas and detained two people.
Outlook
The disruption of the prayer has added a political dimension to an already tense labour dispute, with the NCP accusing police of obstructing a peaceful programme and demanding justice for the worker’s death. Authorities have not yet publicly answered those allegations in detail. The outcome of the police investigation into Toufiq’s death, and any government response to the wage demand, will shape whether the unrest in Bangladesh’s garment belt eases or deepens in the coming days.
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