A police constable died after he along with eight others had became wounded as miscreants exploded several crude bombs into a police car in the Rajshahi city on Thursday when the BNP-led alliance was holding a procession. Constable Siddhartha died from his injuries in Combined Military Hospital in Dhaka on Thursday night after he had been flown from Rajshahi to the capital in the evening, the Boalia police officer-in-charge, Ziaur Rahman, said.
The injured are Shahriar, Majid, Raihan, Rafi, Asad, Sohel, Touhid and Ananda. Among them, Ananda are reported to be in a critical condition, according to physicians at Rajshahi Medical College Hospital.
The latest incident took place two days after a traffic police constable was burnt to death in an arson attack on a bus near Bangla Motor police box in the city on Tuesday night.
Witness said that opposition activists were walking in a procession from Lokanath School when the bombs were exploded into the police van near Rajarhata in the city.
The police arrested at least 35 people in this connection in Rajshahi.
The injured were sent to Rajshahi Medical College Hospital for treatment. Khondokar Nafis Rahman, an orthopaedic surgeon at the RMCH, earlier said that the condition of Siddhartha was ‘very serious.’
Siddhartha was moved to Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman Medical University hospital in Dhaka about 5:00pm.
RMP assistant commissioner Saifur Rahman said that Jamaat and Shibir men might have exploded the bombs, saying that efforts were on to arrest the attackers. At least 35 people have so far been arrested, he added.
The mayor of Rajshahi, Mosaddek Hossain Bulbul, who was leading the BNP-led alliance procession, told New Age that they did not know who exploded the bombs into the police van.
He said that the police had arrested at least 15 BNP, Juba Dal and Chhatra Dal men before they brought out the procession.
Leaders and activists of the BNP-led alliance, meanwhile, went on demonstrations in places across the country protesting at their leaders being killed, wounded and arrested by law enforcers and ruling party men during the opposition blockade.
The acting BNP secretary general on Wednesday announced the protest rallies in divisional cities, districts, upazilas and thanas headquarters.
In Khulna, BNP and Jamaat activists marched down city roads as part of the protests on Thursday afternoon.
The procession ended at the city unit BNP office on KD Ghosh Road with a rally that the BNP’s organising secretary Nazrul Islam Manjo, also the party’s Khulna city unit president, addressed.
In Barisal, the police foiled a procession of the opposition alliance after it crossed 50 yards from the city unit BNP office near the Town Hall about 2.00pm. BNP activists alleged that the police had charged at them with truncheons and dispersed them when they were holding ‘peaceful programme.’
In Rangpur, the BNP-led alliance brought out a procession in the city’s Grand Hotel crossing. The procession, led by the district unit BNP convener Mojaffar Hossian, ended at Payra Chatwar.
New Age correspondents from outlying areas said that the BNP-led alliance had gone on demonstrations in Lakshmipur, Chandpur, Magura, Rajbari, Mymensingh, Gaibandha, Jhenaidah, Panchagarh and many other districts.
-With New Age input
