JCD men unlock BNP central office after 11 hours
A group of leaders of Jatiyatabadi Chhatra Dal (JCD) unlocked the main gate of BNP's Nayapaltan central office after an 11-hour demonstration on Tuesday demanding cancellation of the party's directives about age limit in forming its new committee.
The demonstrators reopened the BNP office around 10pm.
"We've postponed our protest programme for a day. We hope the party will accept our demands," said JCD leader Asaduzzaman who was leading the demonstrators.
Earlier in the day, several hundred leaders and activists of the recently-dissolved JCD central committee gathered in front of the party office around 11am and started demonstration there. At one stage, they locked the main gate and continued their protest programme.
The protesters chanted slogans in favour of their demand for cancellation of the age limit.
The demonstrators of JCD, BNP's student body, also demanded the cancellation of the announcement about dissolving their central committee.
They said they want BNP to form a short-term JCD committee without keeping any age ceiling.
The protestors also snapped the power connection to the BNP office around 12:50pm.
As some ex-JCD leaders, including Shamsuzzaman Dudu, Amanullah Aman, Fazlul Haq Milon, Shaheeduddin
Chowdhury Anne, ABM Mosharraf Hossain, Shafiul Bari Babu came to the spot, the protestors engaged in argument with them and barred them from entering the office.
Ailing BNP senior joint secretary general Ruhul Kabir Rizvi and some other party leaders were staying inside the office.
A group of demonstrators entered the BNP office around 3:55 pm and drove out some BNP and JCD leaders from there, and restored power connection to the office.
They also beat up a JCD leader, Rabiul Islam Nayan.
Ruhul Kabir Rizvi was receiving treatment inside the office at that time as he fell sick.
Two BNP standing committee members--Mirza Abbas and Gayeshwar Chandra Roy-- came to the BNP office in the evening to visit Rizvi.
The protesters allowed them entering the office.
Coming out of the office, Abbas said the JCD men are staging demonstration out of their huff, and the problem will be resolved soon.
Meanwhile, some ex-JCD leaders contacted party acting chairman Tarique Rahman through videoconferencing at BNP chairperson's Gulshan office seeking his directives to resolve the problem.
Later in the evening, a delegation of the demonstrators went to the Gulshan office to contact Tarique.
They came out of the BNP chief's office around 9:30pm and reopened the BNP central office upon Torque's assurance of resolving the problem.
The protesters also visited ailing Rizvi at the office.
On June 3, the central committee of BNP's student body Jatiyatabadi Chhatra Dal (JCD) was dissolved.
A BNP press release, signed by Ruhul Kabir Rizvi, said a new JCD committee will be formed within the next 45 days based on the opinions of its councillors.
It said those who will contest election for different posts of JCD will have to be primary members, students of any educational institution of Bangladesh and must pass SSC and equivalent examination after 2000.
On October 14, 2014, JCD's last committee was formed making Rajib Ahsan its president and Akramul Hasan its general secretary.
