Nizam Hazari ruled as the 'godfather' in Feni

The local people of Masterpara in Feni town refer to the 'ghat' (stairs leading into the pond) in front of the house, Lomi Hazari Bari, as the 'ghatla'. Sitting at this 'ghatla', former Feni-2 member of parliament Nizam Uddin Hazari 'ruled' Feni for 13 years.

Setting up a table at the ghat of the pond in front of his home, he would hand out various contracts, carry out extortion in various sectors, arbitrate party and local disputes and conduct all sorts of activities. From the morning people of all walks of life would stream to the 'ghatla' and wait for him.

Nizam Hazari's 'ghatla rule' came to an abrupt end with the fall of the Awami League government in face of the 5 August student-people's uprising. Nizam Hazari and his followers have fled from Feni. Since then, absolute silence has befallen Nizam Hazari's paternal home Lomi Hazari Bari. However, as members of his cadre force have still not been caught, the people of the area are still too scared to speak about Nizam's misdeeds.

Speaking to persons of various walks of life during a visit to Feni, it was learnt that Nizam's rise began in 2011 when he became the Feni pourashava mayor. After being elected as district Awami League general secretary on 2012, he became the undeclared 'ruler' of Feni. He installed his loyal followers as people's representatives at various levels of the local government from the union parishad up to the upazila parishad.

During the time that Nizam Hazari grew to be a 'godfather', the Fulgazi upazila chairman Ekramul Huq also was an influential leader. Ekram played a vital role in pushing aside their 'guru' Zainul Hazari and organising the party cadre force there. On 20 May 2014 Ekram was openly hacked, set on fire and killed in Feni town. Since then Nizam established his sole control over the party and took over government development tenders there.

Speaking to Prothom Alo, a police officer two served for two years as additional superintendent of police in Feni, said Nizam Hazari had a monopoly on the smuggling across Feni border, tender control, extortion in the transport sector, control of the legal and illegal sand deposits (balumohal) and the entire crime world of the district. No action could be taken against the misdeeds of others either without his permission.

The last criminal incident carried out by Nizam and his associates was on 4 August when they indiscriminately opened fire during the student-people movement, killing 9 persons. That morning Nizam Hazari himself took to the streets with is party cadres to suppress the movement. Towards the afternoon his cadres began firing at the demonstrators. Till now none of the important cadres or armed men have been caught.

Speaking to Prothom Alo at his office on 16 September, the Feni district superintendent of police Habibur Rahman said, "I joined here as SP a week ago. Efforts are on to nab those who have been identified as taking part in the armed attack. So far 12 persons involved in the incident have been arrested. A 12 bore shotgun, a pistol and a single barrel gun have been recovered so far."

Nizam Hazari had been at the 'ghatla' in front of his pond in the afternoon of 5 August. The moment news leaked out of Sheikh Hasina fleeing the country, he fled away too. It is said that he crossed over the Bilonia border and fled into India.

As soon as the government of Sheikh Hasina fell, the irate people first attacked and set on fire his paternal home and then the seven-storey building next to the 'ghatla'. They then attacked, looted and set on fire the farmhouse or villa Nizam had made not far from his paternal home.

The people of Feni were extremely curious about the villa or 'bagan bari' surrounded by a high wall. Only those close to Nizam Hazari would visit here. Even a week after the fall of the government, people from various areas would still stream in to get a glimpse of the place.

Within the sprawling premises of this villa was a helipad, a tennis court, a pool, a beautiful garden, a fountain and a swimming pool. The floor tiles of the villa were reportedly imported from Italy. The furniture was imported from Singapore, Malaysia and Turkey.

According to the locals, there were many tears of the people behind his magnificent villa. Nizam Hazari had more or less forcefully grabbed the land of the local people, some paid a pittance and some nothing at all. Some of the landowners included Nizam Hazari's relations too. There was land belonging to persons of the Hindu community there too.

This correspondent spoke to six persons among those upon whose land the village had been built. None of them were willing to reveal their names. Among them, a relative of Nizam Hazari told Prothom Alo that Nizam had grabbed about one and half bighas of their land. They were obliged to come to a compromise with Nizam Hazari after he constructed the villa. They handed over the land deeds in his name for a perfunctory sum of money. There was still some land which they hadn't written over to him.
There were four persons located who had lost their land and were bereft of everything. But they were unwilling to speak.

Nizam Hazari forcefully snatched around 15 acres of land in Boroachar, Sundarpur and Domra in Baligaon union of Feni Safar upazila. He occupied the land on the pretext of setting up mosques, madrasas and technical schools. This correspondent went there and spoke to 10 persons who were victims of this land grabbing. Other than one of them, the rest were too scared to reveal their names. One of them told Prothom Alo, Nizam Hazari's people grabbed around 2.5 bighas of their land. Later they were forced to register the land in his name.

One of the victims, Sheikh Zahed Hossain, told Prothom Alo, Nizam Hazari had snatched around 2 bighas of their land.

Speaking to Prothom Alo over mobile phone, an expatriate said Nizam Hazari's men had grabbed around 3.5 bighas of their family's lands. They threatened him several times over mobile phone to write the land over to Nizam Hazari. He was too frightened to return to the country for the past five years.

It was learnt from officials of various government offices as well as from certain contractors that Nizam Hazari would even decide who would get contracts for the development projects of the Local Government Engineering Department (LGED), the Water Development Board, Education Engineering Department, Public Works Department, Health Engineering Department, the pourashavas and other government organisations. He would have to be paid a 10 per cent commission from the total project allocation, 25 per cent in certain cases, before the work started. Feni Sadar upazila Awami League general secretary and former upazila chairman Shushen Chandra Sheel was in charge of distributing the development project tenders and collecting the commission.

According to records of the concerned government offices, over the past 15 years there was been various development project work totalling Tk 6 billion (Tk 6000 crore) in Feni district. This included about Tk 24 billion of local government engineering department, around Tk 11 billion of the water development board, Tk 1 billion of the education engineering department. Even if the commission was 10 per cent, these projects along would yield Tk 6 billion in commission for Nizam Hazari.

Feni district LGED executive engineer Mahmud Al Faruk, however, claimed that their tenders had to be submitted online and there was no scope for manipulations. Nizam would be able to say how he collected the commission.

Nizam Hazari and Shushen Chandra Sheel are now absconding. Attempts were made over mobile phone to get their statements, but their mobiles were turned off. WhatsApp messages were sent to them both. Then on Thursday night Shushen Chandra called over WhatsApp and denied the allegations levelled against him.

Sources in the district administration say there were eight legal sand deposits (balumohal) in Feni. Now there are three.

However, local sources say that until the fall of the Sheikh Hasina government, sand would be extracted from at least 30 balumohals. Nizam Hazari would get a cut from the earnings from sand extraction. On behalf of Nizam Hazari, the sand deposits of the Feni river in Chhagalnaiya upazila was controlled by the upazila Awami League general secretary and former upazila chairman Mesbah Uddin Chowdhury alias Sohel and his younger brother Rafiqul Haider Chowdhury.

The sand deposits of Parshuram and Chhagalnaiya upazila were controlled by the Parshuram pourashava mayor Nizam Uddin alias Sajel. The Fulgazi balumohal was controlled by the upazila's former chairman Harun Majumdar. The Lemua and Muhuriganj balumohal were controlled by Fazilpur union parishad former chairman Mujibul Huq (Ripon). The Sonagazi sand deposit was controlled by former pourashava mayor Rafiqul Islam (Ratan).

Speaking to Prothom Alo recently, Feni's additional deputy commissioner Abhishek Das said he had joined this post just a few days ago. He does not have detailed information about the balumohals.

A part of the extortion in the transport sector was controlled by the Truck Workers Union president Mohammad Ali. And the bus stand extortion was controlled by Feni pourashava's former mayor Nazrul Islam alias Swapan Miazi. One of the main controllers of extortion on the footpaths and other 'toll' collected was district Jubo League treasurer Saifuddin alias Jitu and district Chhatra League former vice president Ziauddin Bablu.

All of them are absconding. District Awami League president Hafez Ahmed was contacted to speak about these misdeeds of the party leaders. He said he was unwell and would not be able to speak about these issues.

Towards the end of the eighties, Nizam had been an armed cadre in Chattogram. He had been a follower of Chhatra League leader AZM Nasir Uddin at the time. In the early nineties he was arrested in possession of arms. There were at least eight cases against him in Chattogram, including a mugging case.

When Awami League came to power in 1996, Nizam joined the force of Zainul Hazari, known as the godfather in Feni. Zainul Hazari used him to free Sonagazi upazila of BNP. He gradually became an important cadre of Zainul Hazari.

In the year 2000, Nizam Hazari was sentenced to 10 years in jail in one arms case and seven years in another. He served a 10-year sentence in these two arms cases. Resorting to fraudulent means, he curtailed his imprisonment by two years and 10 months and was released from jail in 2005.

On 10 May 2014, Prothom Alo reported on his being released, spending a shortened time in jail. Using this report, the Feni district Jubo League former joint convener Shakhawat Hossain Bhuiyan filed a writ petition challenging the legitimacy of Nizam Hazari's membership of parliament. At the directives of the High Court, the prison authorities issued a report that said that Nizam Hazari had been released from jail serving 2 years 6 months and 16 days less than his sentence.

Speaking to Prothom Alo, the Feni district Jubo League joint convener Shakhawat Hossain Bhuiyan that Nizam Hazari had been convicted for criminal offence. When proven guilty of such criminal charges, when the convicted person serves his sentence of at least two years and is released from jail, he is not eligible to be a member of parliament for five years after release. Nizam Hazari fraudulently came out from jail serving less than two years of his sentence. Even after his fraudulence was caught out, his membership of parliament remained intact.

Till 2012 Nizam Hazari did not hold any party office. After the caretaker government took over power in 2007, Zainul Hazari fled from the country. Before the 2008 election, Nizam Hazari organised the party cadres in Feni. In 2011 he became the pourashava mayor on the party ticket. That election was rife with allegations of rigging, forceful takeover of the polling centres and other irregularities. A year after that, in 2012 December he became the district Awami League general secretary. In the 2014 vote-less election he was elected member of parliament from the Feni-2 seat.

Several Awami League leaders, speaking to Prothom Alo, said Sheikh Hasina's former protocol officer Alauddin Ahmad Chowdhury (Nasim) was behind Nizam Hazari's phenomenal rise.

Awami League's former general secretary Obaidul Quader's constituency is Noakhali-5 (Companyganj). Companyganj is 23 kilometres from Feni Sadar. When he would come to the constituency, he would spend the night at Feni. Nizam Hazari would arrange for all sorts of entertainment and comforts in Feni for Obaidul Quader. His proximity with Obaidul Quader made Nizam all the more 'untouchable'.

Several leaders of Feni district Awami League, speaking in condition of anonymity to Prothom Alo, said Obaidul Quader had long-standing ties with the Feni pourashava mayor Nazrul Islam alias Swapan Miazi. It was through Nazrul Islam had Obaidul Quader grew close to Nizam Hazari. Over the past 10 years whenever Obaidul Quader went to Feni, he would stay there at Nizam Hazari's hospitality. Previously he would stay at the Feni Circuit House and also at the Kusumbagh villa of a businessman there. But over the past two years he would stay at Nizam Hazari's villa in Master Para.

When asked about the crimes and misdeeds of the ruling party leaders in Feni, eminent citizen of the district and former commander of the district Muktijoddha Sangsad, Abdul Motaleb, told Prothom Alo that the political criminalisation was the same all over the country. Many leaders and people's representatives of Awami League misused their power. Those who resorted to crime and were not transparent in their activities, have now fled from Feni. Many innocent Awami League men were facing flak because of their misdeeds.