A 65-year-old Muslim spiritual leader was hacked to death in central Bangladesh, in an attack that bears the hallmark of previous murders of intellectuals, bloggers and minorities by Islamists in the country.

Shahidullah was found dead with gashes on the right shoulder and a slit throat in a mango orchard in Rajshahi city's Tanor upazila, police said.

His body was recovered after locals called the police around 10 pm last night, said Abdur Razzak, officer-in- charge of Tanor Police Station.

"It seems he was hacked first and then slaughtered," he was quoted as saying by The Daily Star.

There have been systematic assaults in Bangladesh in recent weeks especially targeting minorities, secular bloggers, intellectuals and foreigners.

In the recent attacks, a liberal professor was brutally hacked to death last month by machete-wielding ISIS militants who slit his throat near his home in Rajshahi city.

Two days later, Bangladesh's first gay magazine editor was brutally murdered along with a friend in his flat in Dhaka by Islamists.

Last week, a Hindu tailor was hacked to death by machete-wielding ISIS militants in his shop in central Bangladesh.