The Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) has arrested five members of a robbery gang in connection with the murder of customs official in Cumilla.

Bullet Bairagi, 35, who was attacked and thrown from a moving auto-rickshaw in Cumilla after returning from a training programme in Chattogram, said RAB’s Law and Media Wing Director M.Z.M. Intekhab Chowdhury.

Disclosing the details of the incident at a press conference at Karwan Bazar in Dhaka on Monday, he stated the suspects operated as a coordinated gang, disguising themselves as drivers and passengers to target travellers arriving from distant locations. Victims were lured into CNG-powered auto-rickshaws before being assaulted with sharp weapons and robbed.

The five arrested suspects — Imran Hossain Hridoy, 37; Mohammad Sohag, 30; Ismail Hossain Joni, 25; Mohammad Sujon, 32; and Rahatul Rahman Jewel, 27– were detained during raids across several areas of Comilla on Sunday. Authorities recovered a CNG auto-rickshaw, a cleaver, and a switchblade knife from their possession.

According to RAB, the gang was lying in wait near Jagurzuli Bishworoad area of Cumilla late on the night of April 18. Bullet Bairagi, who had been attending the 44th Foundation Training course in Chattogram since April 11, was returning home to his rented residence in Cumilla’s Rajganj Panpatti.

Around 3am, he arrived at Bishworoad, where suspect Jewel enquired about his destination. When Bairagi said he was headed to Jangalia, suspects Sohag and Hridoy invited him into their auto-rickshaw. En route, Sohag, Joni, and Hridoy attacked him with sharp weapons, seized his mobile phone, cash, and bag, and after a struggle, threw him from the moving vehicle onto the road.

He sustained severe head and facial injuries and died at the scene.

Family members said Bairagi had spoken with them by phone multiple times as he neared home that night, but never arrived. His body was discovered the following morning, Saturday, beside a hotel in Kotbari area of Cumilla along the Dhaka-Chattogram highway.

His mother, Nilima Bairagi, filed a murder case against unknown persons at Comilla Sadar Dakshin Model Police Station on Sunday night.

Bairagi, the only child of Sushil Bairagi of Dumuria village in Tungipara, Gopalganj, served as an Assistant Revenue Officer at Bibir Bazar Land Port in Comilla. He is survived by his wife and one child.