Former state minister for home affairs Tanjim Ahmad Sohel Taj has claimed of receiving a call from the phone of his nephew Syed Iftekhar Alam Shourav, who has been missing since Jun 9.
In a Facebook live stream on Wednesday (Jun 19), he said that Shourav’s parents received the call at 2.20am. “But no one was on the other side,” said Sohel Taj.
Shourav graduated from Dhaka's Independent University before joining a school in Chattogram in a teaching role. He lived with his parents in the port city's Panchlaish.
His mother Syeda Yasmin Arjuman is a cousin of Sohel Taj.
“Around 2.30am, my cousin phoned me, when I also spoken to Manik [Shourav’s father Syed Md Idris Alam]. According to them, the call was made through WhatsApp. They received two to three calls, but the other side was silent. No one received despite calling back several times,” said Sohel Taj, the former Awami League MP from Gazipur-4.
In a media call on Tuesday (Jun 18), he called for the safe return of Shourav and sought Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s help to ensure that his nephew is found unharmed.
In a Facebook live stream later the same day, he said he himself will investigate to find the whereabouts of his missing nephew.

“I will investigate it myself to help the law enforcement agencies and police administration. The information we collect, we will provide to them,” said Sohel Taj.
According to the family, Shourav was picked up by some plainclothes men from in front of Afmi Plaza in Chattogram city on the evening of Jun 9. Sourav went there with his resume for a job after being asked by law enforcers over the phone, but he never returned home.
At Tuesday’s media call at the Dhaka Reporters’ Unity auditorium, Shourav’s mother Syeda Yasmin Arjuman said her son met a woman after the Bangla film “Bengali Beauty” earned fame at home and abroad. He had assisted in making the movie.
Later, they continued the relationship through social media. At one stage, the woman told Sourav that they must marry over phone to continue the relationship, the mother said.
But the woman’s father married her off to another man without her consent, she told the press conference.
She said the marriage ended in divorce sometime in 2018 and the woman’s father blamed Sourav for it. He also threatened Sourav and his family members with life.
According to Arjuman, Shourav was earlier picked up on several occasions by different law enforcement and intelligence agencies. He was interrogated about his relationship with the woman.