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36-hour Hartal by Opposition

Quiet hours on first day

113 pickets jailed; Hafiz, Altaf picked up

Staff Correspondent
The authorities jailed at least 113 people on charges of attacking vehicles and disrupting public life as the BNP-led opposition launched a 36-hour countrywide hartal yesterday to press for continuation of the constitutional provision of holding parliamentary elections under a caretaker government.
Mobile courts convicted and sentenced 58 people including 26 in the capi-
tal, most of them opposition activists, to jail terms ranging from one month to three months in summary trials on the first day of the hartal. Another 55 people were handed similar penalties on the eve of the shutdown on Saturday, when unknown attackers set nine buses afire.
Also yesterday, police arrested scores of protesters, including former BNP ministers Hafizuddin Ahmed and Altaf Hossain Chowdhury, for trying to bring out processions in support of the hartal. Police later filed two cases against the two on charge of torching vehicles at Mohakhali and Shahjadpur in the city.
Meanwhile, BNP acting Secretary General Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir threatened to call a 72-hour or even a seven-day hartal if police continued to arrest BNP men and bar them from staging demonstrations. Fakhrul gave the warning when police intercepted a procession he was leading in front of the party's Naya Paltan central office.
The hartal enforced by BNP and its key ally Jamaat-e-Islami from 6:00am yesterday is scheduled to end at 6:00pm today. This is the second opposition-sponsored hartal in a week.
The opposition is protesting what it says a government move to repeal the 13th amendment to the constitution that mandates an elected government to step down at the end of its term and hand over power to a non-partisan caretaker administration to oversee parliamentary polls.
The Supreme Court has recently voided the 13th amendment but suggested holding two more parliamentary polls under a nonpartisan caretaker government.
In response, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has said there is no scope to retain the caretaker system following the SC ruling. At the same time, she has invited the opposition to come to parliament to offer if it has any new formula.
The BNP-led opposition has refused to discuss the issue with the government and instead opted for hartal and street protests.
The scrapping of the caretaker system will mean the next parliamentary elections will be held under the Awami League government amid opposition fears the vote will be rigged favouring the ruling party.
The latest conflict between the government and the opposition has raised fears about another round of political deadlock long before the next parliamentary elections due in 2014.
The first day of the nationwide hartal or general strike passed off without any major violence barring sporadic explosions of home-made cocktails and scuffles between police and BNP activists in front of the party central office.
At least six cocktails were exploded in the capital's Mirpur, Naya Paltan, Nilkhet and Science Laboratory areas.
Of those, two were blasted in front of Mukta
Bangla Shopping Complex at Mirpur around 8:30pm, two near the BNP office and two others at Nilkhet and Science Laboratory areas around 9:00pm, police said.
New Market police said two youths were handed over to them by some students of Dhaka College who caught them when they were trying to torch a rickshaw in front of the college last night.
In Dhanmondi, a group of youth set fire to a taxicab around 9:00pm.
Even though a few buses, CNG-run auto-rickshaws and private cars operated in defiance of the shutdown, the streets of the capital were almost empty of its bumper-to-bumper traffic. The streets were dominated by rickshaws.
Long-distance buses remained parked in stations, but trains operated as usual. Launch services were disrupted. Shopping complexes, stores along the main streets, and educational institutions remained closed.
Government offices and both state-run and private offices opened with many of the staff walking or riding rickshaws to work. Many commuters were seen riding cargo -carrying vans.
BNP's central office was cordoned off by riot police who prevented party activists from taking out any procession. There were scuffles between police and some senior BNP leaders as they tried to stop the security forces from arresting their supporters.
In the port city of Chittagong, the strike hampered loading, unloading and transportation of goods to and from the port. Unloading of food items, including rice, wheat and sugar from five vessels at port jetties was partially disrupted as trucks could not reach the port.
BNP acting Secretary General Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir led the party activists' gathering in front of the central office.
“The government is suppressing our democratic rights and our freedom of holding meetings," Mirza Fakhrul said. “So, what else can we do but observe hartal?"
On the other hand, Syed Ashraful Islam, general secretary of the ruling Awami League, yesterday called for a political dialogue to resolve the dispute.
Meanwhile, no significant picketing was seen in the capital, as huge contingents of law enforcers remained deployed at different points. Street presence of opposition leaders, workers and supporters was thin.
Sporadic clashes took place between police and opposition activists in different places outside the capital.
The opposition leaders, however, claimed that people spontaneously made the hartal a success. They said party men were trying to stay at different points of the capital but police did not allow them even to enter the party offices.
Police detained more than 256 pickets nationwide including 123 in the city.
Former ministers Hafizuddin and Altaf were arrested from the city's Mohakhali area when they were trying to bring out a procession.
Mirza Fakhrul, however, claimed police arrested more than 700 leaders and workers across the country.
Meanwhile, pickets vandalised a pickup van in the city's Shahjahanpur and torched two buses at Mirpur-13. Police beat up photojournalists while they were covering events in front of the BNP office leaving four of them injured.
Police charged batons to disperse a procession of BNP's cultural wing at Tejgaon that left several persons including singer Baby Naznin injured.
Photojournalists briefly staged a sit-in protest after police beat up some of them while they were taking pictures of a female BNP leader being detained by security forces outside the party central office.