BNP leader Rizvi taken to DB office

BNP Joint Secretary General Ruhul kabir Rizvi has been taken to the Detective Branch (DB) office after Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) handed him over to police.

He was handed over to Badda Police Station around 4:30pm on Saturday after he was arrested in the early hours, Sub-Inspector Humayun Kabir said.

He was arrested in a case filed over torching a vehicle on Badda-Gulshan link road last Monday during the blockade called by the party, OC MA Jalil said.

He was sent to the DB office around 5:30pm, he said.

The BNP leader would be produced before the court on Sunday, he added.

The BNP spokesperson, who was issuing statements calling for shutdowns and blockades from undisclosed places, was arrested from a Baridhara house around 2:45am.

He issued the latest statement calling for a 72-hour shutdown across Bangladesh from Sunday, ignoring the appeal to call of agitations during Secondary School Certificate (SSC) examinations scheduled to start on Monday.

Amid tension over programmes marking the first anniversary of the last general election on Jan 5, police had taken Rizvi to a hospital when he got ‘sick’ at the party’s Naya Paltan headquarters on Jan 3.

He left the hospital stealthily four days later.

He had been issuing the statements from undisclosed places since then.

At least 40 people have been killed, mostly in arson attacks on vehicles, during the nonstop blockades being enforced by BNP-led Alliance demanding snap polls.