Abul Kalam Azad (Bachchu)
| Abul Kalam Azad | |
|---|---|
| Born |
5 March 1947 Faridpur, Bengal Presidency, British Raj (now Bangladesh) |
Abul Kalam Azad, (born 5 March 1947) is a former Bangladeshi politician of the Jamaat-e-Islami, televangelist and convicted war criminal of the Bangladesh liberation war.
He was the first of nine prominent Jamaat-e-Islami members accused of war crimes by the International Crimes Tribunal-2 of Bangladesh to be convicted for crimes against humanity, including murder and rape. On 21 January 2013 Azad was sentenced to death by hanging for his crimes.
Abul Kalam Azad was born on 5 March 1947 to an impoverished farmer, Abdus Salam Mia and his wife of Barakhardia village, under Saltha Police Station of Faridpur District. After attending a qawmi madrasa, he was a student at Rajendra College in Faridpur.
In the 1980s Azad became a regular speaker at a major mosque in Dhaka. He also led an Islamic charity. In 1999, he founded the MACCA, a social charity. Reflecting on its activities he said "We strongly believe that religion and development should work together to help people. We believe development work is only sustainable through religion; otherwise sustainable development is impossible." As part of his social activism, he involved MACCA in an awareness campaign against AIDS.
He anchored a TV show called Apnar Jiggasa (আপনার জিজ্ঞাসা), or Your Questions on a private TV channel in Bangladesh for several years before the trial.
The investigations alleged that during the Bangladesh Liberation War of 1971, he, then known as "Bachchu", aged 24, was a close associate of Ali Ahsan Mohammad Mojaheed, then president of the East Pakistan Islami Chhatra Sangha, the student wing of the Jamaat-e-Islami. The prosecution alleges that before the formation of the Razakar paramilitary force, Azad actively aided the Pakistani army in committing criminal acts.
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