Police launch investigation into IED discovered at Dhaka metro station
Dhaka police have initiated a formal investigation under the Explosives Substances Act following the discovery of an improvised explosive device (IED) at the Motijheel metro rail station on Friday. Authorities are currently working to determine the origin of the device, identify the perpetrators, and establish whether the incident is linked to a broader extremist network.
The investigation is being conducted by the Motijheel police in coordination with the Dhaka Metropolitan Police’s (DMP) Counter Terrorism and Transnational Crime (CTTC) unit. While no suspects have been identified, officials are examining potential connections to a series of recent explosive incidents in Keraniganj, Jatrabari, Sayedabad, and Comilla.
The device was discovered inside an umbrella near a generator room at the metro station by a traffic sergeant on duty during the Ulta Rath Yatra procession. While police bomb disposal units successfully neutralized the IED, a passerby—a Ministry of Education employee named Miraj Hossain—sustained eye injuries from shrapnel.
According to Assistant Commissioner of the Motijheel zone, Hossain Mohammad Farabi, investigators have faced challenges retrieving clear surveillance footage from the area, as some cameras were non-functional at the time. Preliminary assessments suggest the device was likely planted specifically to disrupt the religious procession as it passed through the Motijheel area.
Law enforcement agencies have increasingly focused on potential links to radical factions following a December explosion at a house in Keraniganj that served as a clandestine storage site for chemical precursors and IEDs. Investigations into that incident, which led to the arrest of 17 individuals, revealed a network utilizing hazardous chemicals to construct explosives. Subsequent analysis linked the suspects behind the Keraniganj blast to similar explosive encounters in Jatrabari, Sayedabad, and Comilla between February and March.
The CTTC unit is now conducting forensic comparisons between the IED recovered in Motijheel and those seized in previous incidents. While the Keraniganj devices were chemically volatile, the Motijheel IED was housed in a metal pipe rigged with a circuit and battery. Investigators are currently cross-referencing these forensic details with evidence collected from the previous cases to determine if the same militant network is responsible for the recent attempt in the capital.
