A 21-year-old muezzin in Malda was allegedly gunned down at home allegedly by some of his neighbours on Tuesday morning.

Police have recovered his body. However, the assailants have fled.

Sources said that for years, there has been a dispute over the ownership of land among two groups of neighbours in Jalalpur, a village under Chanchal police station.

Some residents of the village such as Ahad Ali, Mostafa, Ezabil and Mazharul claimed that they owned the one-bigha land under Hazratpur mouza of Chanchal. On the other hand, the families of Ilias Ali and Amzad Ali who also dwell in Jalalpur, claimed ownership of the same plot. The issue is sub judice.

However, on Monday night, Ahad and his associates allegedly lobbed bombs at the house of Ilias and Amzad. On Tuesday morning, they entered the house and beat up three male members of the family.

As Sahidul Rehman, a young member of the family who is also a muezzin, tried to resist the attackers, one of the attackers allegedly whipped out a firearm and shot him in his head.

Sahidul died on the spot.

Samaun Ali, his brother, said the police didn’t intervene after Monday night’s attack. “Our house is barely 300 metres away from the local police camp. Yet the attackers came, beat us and gunned down my brother in broad daylight. We want all culprits to be arrested immediately,” he said.

The killing sparked protests in the village. Rehmna’s family and their neighbours resisted the police from taking away the body.

Purnendu Kundu, the inspector in charge of Chanchal police station, and Suvendu Mondal, the subdivisional police officer of Chanchal, reached the spot. It took the police around four hours for them to persuade the demonstrators and take the body for post-mortem.