The Hefajat-e Islam, a Chittagong-based Islamist group holding a “so-called” long march today, has 12 other demands apart from the arrest of “atheist bloggers”.

People in general are taken aback by the strangeness of such demands.

The 13 points are:

• Reinstate the phrase “Absolute trust and faith in the Almighty Allah” in the constitution as one of the fundamental principles of state policy.
• Pass a law keeping a provision of capital punishment for maligning Allah, Islam and Prophet Muhammad and smear campaigns against Muslims.
• Punish the “atheist” leaders of Shahbagh, bloggers and anti-Islamists who make “derogatory comments” about Prophet Muhammad (pbuh).
• Stop killing, attacking and shooting Islamic scholars and madrasa students.
• Free all the arrested Islamic scholars and madrasa students.
• Lift restrictions on mosques and remove obstacles to holding religious programmes.
• Declare Qadianis (Ahmadiyyas) non-Muslim and stop their publicity and conspiracies.
• Ban all foreign culture including free mixing of men and women and candlelit vigil.
• Stop setting up sculptures at intersections, colleges and universities across the country.
• Make Islamic education mandatory from primary to higher secondary levels after scrapping women policy and education policy.
• Stop threatening teachers and students of Qawmi madrasas, Islamic scholars, imams and khatibs.
• Stop creating hatred against Muslims among young generation by misrepresentation of Islamic culture in the media.
• Stop anti-Islam activities by NGOs, evil attempts by Qadianis and conversion by Christian missionaries at Chittagong Hill Tracts and elsewhere in the country.