Tuesday, 6 January 2015

Khaleda can be arrested: Inu

TORCHING 3-WHEELER AT KAZIPARA

‘BNP didn’t get permission for failing to guarantee a peaceful rally’
Star Online Report
BNP Chairperson Khaleda Zia can be arrested in connection with the torching of a CNG-run three-wheeler at Kazipara in Dhaka on December 28, Information Minister Hasanul Haq Inu said today.
“The home ministry is mulling filing of a case against her regarding the matter,” the minister said at a press conference at the Secretariat this morning.
If a murder case can be filed against the contractor concerned for the death of four-year-old Jihad at Shahjahanpur Colony, a case can be also filed against the BNP chief in connection with the three-wheeler torching, said Inu.
The BNP chief, who remains confined to her Gulshan office in Dhaka, cannot go out as a large number of law enforcers still remain deployed in front of the main gate.
Though a dozen of brick and sand-laden trucks, which were parked since Sunday midnight near her office, have been taken away, the main gate still remains locked. But two lorries of policemen remained stand there since Sunday midnight.
The BNP chief made her last-ditch effort to come out yesterday afternoon by a car but law enforcers did not let her do so by blocking the entrance and using pepper spray on BNP leaders and activists who tried to force open the gate.
 “Since announcing the January 5 rally, Khaleda Zia is delivering speech instigating her supporters to carry out anarchy. She has been kept refrained from further instigation,” Inu said at the briefing today.
Khaleda’s son Tarique Zia is also trying to create anarchy by instigating their followers through video speech, he alleged. “He instigated his followers to cut different parts of Dhaka from the others.”
“The BNP could not assure the government of a peaceful rally. This is why they were not given permission,” said the minister.
In the name of peaceful rally, “they were planning to create an abnormal situation”, he said.
Protesting her confinement in her Gulshan office and the locking of the party office by police, Khaleda called an indefinite, countrywide blockade from today.
Published: 12:58 pm Tuesday, January 06, 2015
Last modified: 5:14 pm Tuesday, January 06, 2015

Fakhrul held, taken to DB HQ

BNP calls 25-hr hartal from 5:00pm in Thakurgaon
Star Online Report
Mirza Fakhrul gets in car after he came out of the Jatiya Press Club in Dhaka. Photo: Amran Hossain
Mirza Fakhrul gets in car after he came out of the Jatiya Press Club in Dhaka. Photo: Amran Hossain
Detectives arrested BNP acting secretary general Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir in a bus torching case filed with Paltan Police Station and took him to the DB headquarters. The Detective Branch of police picked up him as he came out of the Jatiya Press Club in Dhaka around 24 hours after he took shelter there amid protest by pro-government journalists.
In protest against the arrest, BNP has called a 25-hour hartal from 5:00pm today in Thakurgaon district, the hometown of Fakhrul, reports our district correspondent.
In a statement in the evening, BNP Chairperson Khaleda Zia condemned the atrocities by the administration and called upon the people to rise against the undemocratic behaviour of the government.
She demanded immediate unconditional release of her party’s spokesperson Mirza Fakhrul and other leaders and activists now in jail.
“On the one hand, the government has kept me confined to my office, on the other hand, it has arrested my party’s acting secretary general in a fascist style,” she said.
The government has launched an arrest spree across the country while the people are passing through a tense situation, the former premier alleged.
Khaleda, also chief of the BNP-led 20-party alliance, has accused the government of misusing the state power and said people are no longer with the ruling Awami League and so it has been carrying out repression and oppression on them.
As soon as Fakhrul came out of the press club premises, four detectives forcibly got in his car and made the driver to drive the vehicle straight to the DB’s Mintoo office, our correspondent reported from the spot.
Deputy Commissioner of DB (South) Krishna Pada Roy told The Daily Star Online that he will be produced before court in the arson case in which he is an accused.
“Later, he will be shown arrested in other cases,” he added.
Speaking to a The Daily Star correspondent from his car, the BNP leader said the ongoing anti-government movement will continue “even if I am arrested.”
Minutes before getting out of the press club, Fakhrul held a press conference at the VIP conference room where he explained the reasons of his staying overnight at the club.
“I did not go out of the press club because of my personal security. I stayed overnight here and took their traditional hospitality,” he told the reporters.
After attending a programme at the press club premises yesterday afternoon, but “I saw all gates of the press club locked and surrounded by police and Awami League activists.”
Fakhrul went to the press club to attend a programme organised by pro-BNP professions at its auditorium yesterday and later he took shelter at the club office around 2:30pm while pro-and anti-government activists were chasing and counter-chasing each other on the premises.

Since then, the pro-Awami League journalists had been protesting his taking shelter at the press club.

The journalists loyal to the government around 1:00pm brought out a procession on the first floor of the press club and chanted slogans demanding eradication of Fakhrul from the premises.
“Press club is not a place for politics. If he [Fakhrul] does not leave the premises within 2:00pm, we will declare further protest programmes and press club authorities will be held responsible for consequences,” Iqbal Sobhan Chowdhury, media adviser to Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, said at a press briefing held at the club around 1:30pm.
Earlier around 1:00pm, a faction of Projonmo League, chanting slogans, tried to break into the press club.
A few platoons of police were deployed in front of the press club, said Shibli Noman, assistant commissioner of Ramna zone.
Before leaving the press club, the BNP spokesperson sought bail from the High Court in three separate vandalism cases filed with Paltan and Motijheel police stations. He moved the bail petitions through his lawyers.
The cases were filed with Motijheel and Paltan police stations on charges of vandalising vehicles and preventing police from discharging their duties in the areas on January 4.
Fakhrul made prime accused in the cases.
Pro-Awami League journalists chant slogans demanding eradication of BNP leader Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir on Tuesday. Photo: Fardaus Mobarok
Pro-Awami League journalists chant slogans demanding eradication of BNP leader Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir from Jatiya Press Club premises on Tuesday. Photo: Fardaus Mobarok
Published: 12:11 pm Tuesday, January 06, 2015
Last modified: 7:08 pm Tuesday, January 06, 2015

HC orders refund of extra fees to SSC candidates

Star Online Report
The High Court today ordered the government to make the schools concerned refund extra money charged from Secondary School Certificate (SSC) candidates by January 20.
Otherwise, a HC bench said, the existing management committees of those schools would be cancelled and its members barred from holding any position in the school governing committees for the next three years.
The suo moto order, came from the bench of Justice Quazi Reza-Ul Hoque and Justice Abu Taher Md Saifur Rahman this morning on based on reports run that some schools charged eight times more for registering a SSC candidate.
On November 10 last year, the bench issued the rule asking the government to explain as to why charging extra examination fees from students should not be declared illegal.
The court also ordered the government to stop charging of extra examination fees at schools across the country immediately.
According to government regulations, the enrolment fee for an SSC candidate was fixed at Tk 1,400. But a recent report of Bangla daily Jugantor said that some students were compelled to pay upto eight times more for appearing in SSC exams.
Today, principals, headmasters and heads of the managing committees of 20 Dhaka schools concerned appeared before the HC bench as per an earlier order.

AD BANNAR