Road adjoining Indian High Commission in Dhaka named ‍‍`Shaheed Felani Road‍‍`

Amid growing anti-India sentiment, a road adjoining the Indian High Commission in Dhaka has been named ‍‍`Shaheed Felani Road‍‍` by a citizens group initiative in protest of ‍‍`border killings‍‍` - the killing of Bangladeshi citizens by India‍‍`s Border Security Force in the frontier regions.

An organization named People‍‍`s Activist Coalition (PAC) installed a nameplate denoting as much on the road, ignoring police‍‍`s attempts to obstruct them, on Friday afternoon.

Some people started gathering on the road in front of the Indian High Commission around 4 pm.

Police and army personnel took position on that road and stopped the movement of people and vehicles.

Around 4:30 pm, when the leaders and workers of the PAC went to install the nameplates, the police stopped them.

They were heard chanting slogans like ‍‍`Delhi na Dhaka/ Dhaka Dhaka‍‍`.

At one stage, a nameplate was installed on the road saying "Shaheed Felani Road."

Felani, a minor Bangladeshi girl, worked as a domestic help in New Delhi. She was returning home with her father through Anantapur border in Kurigram district on January 7, 2011, when members of the Indian Border Security Force (BSF) shot her dead. Her body was handed over to Bangladesh a day later.

Bangladesh recently strongly protested two border killings in the space of eight days by BSF.

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Bangladesh lodged the first formal protest to the Government of India on the killing of a 13-year-old Bangladeshi girl, Shwarna Das of Juri upazila of Moulvibazar district, who was shot and killed by Border Security Force (BSF) of India on September 1.

In the protest note sent to the Indian High Commission in Dhaka, Bangladesh strongly protested and condemned such ruthless acts and expressed deep concern over the incidents.

The government of Bangladesh reminded that such incidents of border killing are undesirable and unwarranted and such actions are in violation of the provisions of the Joint Indo-Bangladesh Guidelines for Border Authorities, 1975.

The government of Bangladesh called upon the government of India to stop repetition of such heinous acts and conduct enquiries into all border killings, identify the responsible persons and bring them to justice.