Shawdesh Desk: Barguna Police on Tuesday arrested Aysha Siddika Minni, widow of Rifat Sharif who was hacked to death in front of her in Barguna district town on June 26, in the case of Rifat’s murder.

‘We arrested Minni as a suspect in the case on the basis of our investigation since the murder, statement of witnesses and after her daylong interrogation,’ Barguna district superintendent of police Maruf Hossain told New Age last night.

Earlier in the morning, police took Minni to the police super’s office for interrogation over the murder of her husband Rifat, he said.

United News of Bangladesh added, a team of police went to Minni’s house near Barguna Police Lines around 9:45am and took her to the SP office.

However, SP Maruf Hossain said police brought Minni to his office to take her statement as a witness in the murder case.

The new development came after Rifat’s father Dulal Sharif and locals demanded Minni’s arrest alleging that she had a part in the gruesome murder of her husband.

At a press conference at Barguna Press Club on Saturday night, Dulal Sharif demanded the arrest of his daughter-in-law.

He had alleged that Minni concealed the matter that she was previously married to Sabbir Ahmed alias Nayon Bond, the prime accused of the Rifat murder case who was killed in a reported gunfight with the police on July 2, and she used to visit Nayon’s house frequently.

Besides, locals formed a human a human chain on the Barguna Press Club premises on Sunday morning to press for the same demand.

Soon after the human chain, Minni arranged a press conference at her father’s house where she claimed that a rumour was being spread against her to protect the murderers. ‘My father-in-law (Dulal Sharif) is sick and he has no balance,’ she added.

She alleged that a vested group has been out to implicate her in the case through misguiding her father-in-law so that the accused could go scot-free.

About the claim that she had previously married to Nayon Bond, Minni refuted it saying, ‘Why hadn’t Nayon stood in my way when I married Rifat if I had earlier married him?’

Police have so far arrested 13 people in connection with the Rifat murder while seven of them confessed to their involvement in the murder.

A video clip of the murder captured in a surveillance camera went viral on social media. It showed criminals hacking Rifat Sharif brutally in broad daylight in front of Barguna Govt College while his wife Minni was trying to save him.

Rifat was sent to Sher-e-Bangla Medical College Hospital in Barishal where he died.

Dulal Sharif, the father of Rifat, filed a case against 12 people.