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income people, like them. They will sell their finds to recyclers.

Excavators and a crane had torn down the building between 8 at night on Wednesday and 11 in the morning the next day.

Yesterday morning, a crowd of curious spectators gathered: Some peered inside and around the demolished structure, others took selfies, and motorists slowed down to take a look.

A few individuals were breaking parts of the pillars with hammers to collect bricks.

A few young people went to the basement.

The protest began after an announcement that prime minister Sheikh Hasina would deliver a speech online.

The protesters created a Facebook event titled “Bulldozer March”, urging people to gather on Dhanmondi 32 at 7:30pm on Wednesday.

Large crowds gathered, and by 9:30pm, the building was set ablaze.

Shortly before midnight, a crane and an excavator were at the scene. In the following couple of hours, parts of the building were razed to the ground. The heavy equipment left the scene by 11:00am on Thursday.

The protesters also demolished parts of an adjacent building which housed an art gallery and an extension of the Bangabandhu Memorial Museum.

Last night, 15 people were injured in Gazipur city as locals assaulted a group of young men who tried to vandalise the ancestral home of former Liberation War affairs minister AKM Mozammel Haque, reports our correspondent from the city.

Witnesses said dozens of men gathered near the house of the Gazipur AL president in the Dhirashram when locals stopped them. As the men tried to run away, locals caught 15 of them and assaulted them, said Arifur Rahman, officer-in-charge of Gazipur Sadar Police Station, adding that two of them were in critical condition

The injured men were sent to the Shaheed Tajuddin Ahmed Medical College Hospital.

ARSON ON THURSDAY NIGHT

Protesters set fire to the house of Awami League Presidium Member Sheikh Selim in the capital’s Banani around 1:30am yesterday. Firefighters said they didn’t dare go to the scene because there were not enough law enforcers to protect them.

In Noakhali’s Begumganj and Hatiya, the houses of former army chief Moeen U Ahmed and former MPs Mohammad Ali and Ayesha Ferdous were vandalised and set on fire on Thursday night.

The incidents occurred between 8:00pm and 2:30am. Upon receiving reports, separate teams of the army and police visited the sites.

Liton Dewan, officer-in-charge of Begumganj Police Station, told The Daily Star that a group of over 100 men wearing masks and helmets stormed the house of Moeen in Chaumuhani around 8:00pm.

The two-storey house, owned by Moeen’s younger brother Minhaj Ahmed Jabed, former vice president of Noakhali Awami League, was extensively looted and vandalised. The men set fire to a sofa in the drawing room before leaving, he said.

Shortly afterwards, they tried but failed to break into Awami League leader Akhter Hossain Faisal’s house, said OC Liton.

Major Tanvir of the army’s Noakhali camp said a team responded immediately after receiving information about the attack on the former army chief’s house. He added that he had discussed the matter with BNP Vice Chairman Barkat Ullah Bulu and other political leaders.

Ariful Islam, convener of the Noakhali unit of Students Against Discrimination, denied involvement in the attacks.

Protesters set the house of former minister SM Rezaul Karim on fire in Pirojpur’s Nazirpur Upazila on Thursday night.

Meanwhile, the front side of the residence of AHM Khairuzzaman Liton, former mayor of Rajshahi City Corporation and member of the Awami League presidium, was demolished around 11:00pm.

Protesters defaced a mural of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman at Sheikh Mujib Tower in Kaliganj, Jhenaidah.

AL offices, properties of party leaders, and murals of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman were demolished across Dinajpur, Naogaon, and Joypurhat that night.