The capital鈥檚 Mohammadpur area has turned into a crime zone as incidents of mugging, robbery, gunfights, thefts and murders are increasing in the area and the law enforcement agencies are struggling to handle the situation.
The police said that many incidents of crimes were not being reported as the victims of the incidents were not willing to file cases.
The members of law enforcement agencies, in joint drives between 6:00pm and 11:00pm on Saturday, arrested 45 people for their suspected involvement in criminal activities.
The arrested ones include those accused in murder cases, suspected muggers, robbers, and members of teenage gangs.
The Bangladesh Army, the Rapid Action Battalion and the police conducted the joint drives.
They arrested the 45 people and seized nine locally-made sharp weapons in Dhaka Udyan, Chand Udyan, and Nabodaya Housing areas of Mohammadpur, said a press release issued on Sunday by the Inter-Services Public Relations Directorate.
The police said that they also arrested an accused in a murder case at the camp on Sunday.
The police and locals said that a tense situation had been prevailing in the camp for the Urdu-speaking people since Saturday evening when four people, including a child, sustained bullet injuries in a gunfight reportedly between two groups of drug peddlers there.
Three of the injured were admitted to Shaheed Surhrawardy Medical College Hospital and the child, Sazzad Hossain, 13, was admitted to Dhaka Medical College Hospital, DMCH police outpost in-charge Md Faruk said.
Victim Sazzad鈥檚 mother Joynob Begum said that his son was critically injured when he went to bring water from the camp.
Mohammadpur police station inspector (investigation) Md Hafizur Rahman said that they sent the 46 arrested ones to a Dhaka metropolitan magistrate court on Sunday and the court sent 30 of them to jail in different cases and released 16 others after realising fines and taking undertakings from them.
He said that they also detained four individuals from the camp of Urdu-speaking people Sunday evening for interrogation.
On Sunday, a large number of army and police personnel were deployed around the area of the camp for the Urdu-speaking people.
On Saturday evening, a group of students and leaders of different social organisations went to Mohammadpur police station, blamed police inaction for deteriorated law and order situation and demanded to address the situation within 72 hours.
Dhaka Metropolitan Police鈥檚 additional deputy commissioner for Tejgaon zone Ziaul Haque said that they were now suffering from crisis of manpower and vehicles.
Zia also urged the students and the people to help them to contain mugging incidents in the area.
The zone鈥檚 deputy commissioner Mohammad Ruhul Kabir Khan said that they had already decided to set up a temporary joint camp of the army and the police at Mohammadpur Government High School, adjacent to the camp for Urdu-speaking people.
鈥榃e hope that the situation will return to normalcy within one or two days,鈥� the DC added.
On Sunday evening, the police also arrested two blacksmiths and seized 40 machetes from them.聽
Only in September, Mohammadpur police station recorded 68 cases over murders, rapes, mugging, abduction, arms recovery, drug peddling, and pornography.聽
Many victims, however, do not come to the police station to file cases, said Mohammadpur police station officer-in-charge Ali Iftekhar Hasan.
On October 12, a group of 25 or 30 people in Army and RAB uniforms looted Tk 75.50 lakh in cash, 70 bhoris of gold, two iPhones, and one Android mobile phone on a third-floor apartment of a five-storey building in the Swapnanir Housing area of Mohammadpur.
On October 13, RAB arrested eight robbery suspects, including five sacked military personnel, and detectives arrested three suspects over the looting incident.
On October 25 evening, a group of youths robbed a mini supershop at Basila Housing in Mohammadpur.
