BNP brawl at Zia’s grave

Leaders of the BNP had to struggle to maintain discipline when the party’s Dhaka metropolitan unit came to Sher-e-Bangla Nagar to pay respects at party founder Ziaur Rahman’s mausoleum.

Staff Correspondentbdnews24.com
Published : 24 July 2014, 03:11 PM
Updated : 24 July 2014, 03:11 PM

Members were seen pushing and shoving each other. Some female leaders even got into a fight.

On Thursday, acting Secretary General Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir led the new metropolitan committee to lay wreaths at Zia’s grave.

BNP activists gathered at Chandrima Udyan after taking out marches from thanas and wards to join the event scheduled for 11am.

At 11:40pm, BNP standing committee member Gayeshwar Chandra Roy, who is also a member of the new metropolitan committee, arrived at the grave. Mirza Fakhrul arrived 10 minutes later.

Fakhrul was flanked by Roy on the one side and Mirza Abbas, the new Dhaka City unit chief, and Abdul Awal Mintoo, an advisor to the party chief Khaleda Zia, on the other.

Suddenly, Habib-Un Nabi Khan Sohel, who is the member secretary of the new committee, shoved Roy to get in front.

Roy, a senior BNP policymaker, was visibly angered and made to leave the venue. Fakhrul and Abbas managed to calm him down and the leaders laid the wreaths on Zia’s grave.

Earlier, former MP Nilofar Chowdhury Moni was attacked by Jatiyatabadi Chhatra Dal’s Assistant Organising Secretary Nasima Akhter Keya after a brief argument about where they were standing.

Student front leader Keya pulled at Moni’s hair and punched her several times.

Jatiyatabadi Mahila Dal President Nuri Ara Safa was pushed away from where she was standing by another female activist.

All of this took place in front of the members of the woman front, Mahila Dal, but no one appeared to have any reaction.

Thousands of BNP activists joined the event with banners and festoons.

Mirza Fakhrul was unable to speak to reporters at first because of the crowd of supporters pushing on them.

Angry senior leaders eventually moved near the lake, where Fakhrul spoke to the media.

“Our movement will continue until we achieve victory,” he said.

“For the last five years we have been fighting for fair elections. No one joined the government’s election farce on Jan 5. After Eid we will move again,” he said.

Fakhrul hoped that the new Dhaka metropolitan committee would play its role in the movement.

Mirza Abbas said his main task as the new convener was to reform the Dhaka City committees and prepare the unit for the upcoming movement.

Last Friday, the BNP announced its 52-strong Dhaka metropolitan unit committee led by Abbas.

In 2011, former Dhaka mayor and party Vice-Chairman Sadeque Hossain Khoka was put in charge of the committee and asked to form a full committee within six months but it did not happen in three years.

Members of BNP's Dhaka City unit berated the Khoka-led previous committee after the party failed to thwart the Jan 5 national election.