“What is the purpose of voting? It has turned into a Joke,” he told journalists on Tuesday.
Afroza Abbas, wife of the BNP-backed Dhaka South mayoral candidate Mirza Abbas, said voters were denied their right to vote.
M Manjur Alam, whom BNP supported in Chittagong, also labelled the similar allegation.
Pro-BNP Adarsha Dhaka Andolan, which was formed to support civic polls candidates, said what had happened on Tuesday, could not be called ‘polling’.
Adarsha Dhaka Andolon Convenor Emajuddin Ahmed told a press conference at Naya Paltan: “I’ve seen many polls in my life, but never seen such an inferior, hateful and loathsome election.”
“It cannot be called an election. It was a drill of casting vote using force,” he said.
The former Dhaka University vice chancellor went to Dhaka College poling centre along with his son and granddaughter to cast their votes.
He faced heated barbs while coming out of the centre.
“A student of Dhaka College asked me, ‘you burn people to death. Don’t you feel ashamed? Now you’ve come here to cast vote,” he said.
Ahmed, an adviser to BNP chief Khaleda Zia, said the student had broken his car’s window hurling a stone.
He said the objective for which they participated in the polls had failed.
“We participated in the polls to come out of the situation which is prevailing for last 3-4 years. Begum Zia also supported us. Our aim was to bring back democracy to Bangladesh,” Ahmed said.
“But seeing the vote rigging, we think our aim has failed.”
He claimed that the Election Commission ‘has completely failed’ to conduct the polls in a free and neutral manner.