The government and Hifazat-e Islam are facing off over the Islamist group’s planned rally in Dhaka on Tuesday.
The Chittagong-based Islamist group announced its Motijheel rally eight months after its violent May 5 programme to press for its controversial 13-point charter of demand that included scrapping the national policy to empower women.
State Minister for Law Qamrul Islam has said the group would be denied permission claiming it had plans to create disorder in the guise of a rally.
He also alleged the BNP and Jamaat-e-Islami had links with the Hifazat.
Meanwhile, the BNP, which had backed the radical group’s May 5 rally, said it would not ease its ongoing four-day blockade to facilitate Hifazat’s rally.
Led by nonagenarian Shah Ahmad Shafi, chief of the Hathazari Madrasa, the little-known group shot to the spotlight last February opposing the Ganajagaran Mancha, a secular platform demanding maximum penalty for convicted war criminals.
The Hifazat termed the Mancha activists ‘atheists’ and demanded their punishment.
From its May 5 rally, the Hifazat unleashed a string of violence in the capital in which several people were killed. The law-enforcing agencies later drove them off in a late night raid.
Police have not yet granted the group permission for its Dec 24 programme but Hifazat leadership is hopeful about a last-minute nod.
Hifazat’s Secretary General Zunaid Babunagri in a media statement on Sunday said they will voice their demands with “hundreds of thousands of revolutionaries”.
Babunagri criticised the government for its ‘involvement’ with ‘anti-Islam activities’.
He claimed the ruling quarters had positioned themselves against democracy and the people’s rights and were “threatening Bangladesh’s sovereignty”.
The Hifazat’s Secretary General alleged the government was killing numerous people daily without hesitation to cling to power.
State Minister Qamrul Islam on Sunday said: “The Hifazat will not be given rally permission no matter whatever they do.
“They want to create another anarchic situation in the name of their rally,” he said referring to the group’s May 5 mayhem.
A top police official told bdnews24.com that there was no chance of Hifazat getting the clearance.
“Law and order in the capital is better than other districts in the country. Permitting their [Hifazat] rally will be like giving a third force chance to carry out acts of sabotage.”
The Islamist group’s Organising Secretary Azizul Haque Islamabadi on Sunday evening told bdnews24.com that they would hold the rally anyway.
“Allama Shafi has already ordered everyone to gather at Dhaka on their own.”
But, Hifazat leaders did not say when Shafi himself will come to the capital.
State Minister Qamrul asked law enforcers to stay sharp saying that the Islamist group may try to organise the rally without permission.
The BNP-led 18-Party alliance is enforcing a four-day blockade across Bangladesh. It will end in the afternoon of Tuesday.
Islamabadi said they had urged the Opposition to ease the blockade. “Otherwise, thousands of our supporters from districts adjacent to the capital will have to walk all the way to Dhaka.”
However, asked whether the blockade programme would be relaxed, BNP Standing Committee member Nazrul Islam Khan at a press briefing on Sunday said a decision was yet to be made.
Central Hifazat leaders were firm on their position regarding the rally, but leaders in Dhaka seemed a little soft on the issue.
Hifazat’s central committee Joint Secretary General Md Jafarullah told bdnews24.com that they were hoping the government would give them clearance at the last minute.
“We will hold a press briefing and inform the people of our position if a permission is not given.”
Hifazat’s Nayeb-e-Amir and Dhaka metropolitan unit convenor Nur Hossain Kasemi was seen at the RAB-1 headquarters in the capital’s Uttara earlier in the day.
The Hifazat alleged he was detained, but RAB denied it. Kasemi was seen leaving the RAB headquarters one and a half hours later.
RAB-1 Commander Kismat Hayat told bdnews24.com: “We did not detain him. He came to speak to us about their Dec 24 rally.”
Source: bdnews24
