BANGLADESH CRICKETER APOLOGISES FOR ATTENDING KALI PUJA CELEBRATIONS

Bangladesh cricketer Shakib Al Hasan on Tuesday tendered a public apology after receiving Islamist threats for attending a Hindu ceremony in Kolkata. The leading Bangladeshi all-rounder, who has recently completed a year’s ban for failing to report corrupt approaches, faced Islamist threats after he attended a Kali Puja ceremony in Kolkata.

Islamic preachers in Bangladesh say people should not attend the ceremonies of other faiths.

“I was on the stage for barely two minutes. People are talking about this and thought I inaugurated it,” Shakib told an online forum late Monday. “I did not do this and being a conscious Muslim I would not do this. But, maybe, I should not have gone there. I am sorry for this and apologise,” he said.

“As a practising Muslim I always try to follow religious customs. Please forgive me if I have done anything wrong,” he emphasised.

The cricketer spoke hours after a man threatened him on a Facebook live forum, accusing him of “hurting religious sentiment”. The man later apologised and went into hiding, but he was arrested in the northeastern district of Sunamganj on Tuesday.

Shakib, currently the International Cricket Council’s top-ranked all-rounder in one-day internationals, was found in October 2019 to have breached the ICC anti-corruption code and was banned for two years, with one year suspended.

In 2015, he became the first cricketer to hold the ICC’s top all-rounder ranking in the game’s three formats — Tests, one-day internationals and Twenty20 internationals.

With agency inputs