Khaleda will be back to jail if BNP crosses the line: PM Hasina warns BNP

Prime Minister Sheilh Hasina has warned the BNP that its chairperson Khaleda Zia would be sent back to jail if the party crosses the line in the name of movement.

"We have given her [Khaleda] scope to stay in her house, suspending her sentence on humanitarian grounds. If BNP does excesses, we will send her back to jail," the prime minister said.

The premier was addressing a discussion arranged by the Bangladesh Awami League at the Bangabandhu International Conference Centre in the capital on the occasion of the Jail Killing Day.

Khaleda Zia was convicted in the Zia Orphanage Trust case and sentenced to 10-year in jail. Her sister, brother and sister's spouse came to the PM with a plea to release her.

At the discussion programme, Sheikh Hasina said her government will not spare the BNP if it resorts to violence in the name of movement.

"I told them [BNP] we will say nothing if they hold peaceful processions and meetings. But they are going for showdown bearing sticks, if they attack any person, we will not spare them," she said.

The PM said the BNP's movement means arson violence. "What a mayhem they carried out across Bangladesh in 2013, 2014 and 2015. They proved that they are allies of the Pakistani occupation force," she said, giving an account of the damage caused by the mayhem.

She questioned how the BNP dreams that the people will vote for them as the party did not stand beside the people with nominal assistance during any tough time.

AL General Secretary Obaidul Quader delivered the welcome speech at the programme while AL presidium members Sheikh Fazlul Karim Selim, Engr Mosharraf Hossain and Mofazzal Hossain Chowdhury Maya, AL central committee member Parvin Zaman Kalpana, martyred Syed Nazrul Islam's daughter Dr Syeda Zakia Noor Lipi, and Dhaka South and North City AL presidents Abu Ahmed Monnafi and Sheikh Bazlur Rahman spoke at the event.

AL publicity and publication secretary Abdus Sobhan Golap and his deputy Aminul Islam moderated the discussion.

The day is observed to remember four national leaders Syed Nazrul Islam, Tajuddin Ahmed, Captain M Mansur Ali and AHM Quamruzzaman who were assassinated inside the Dhaka Central Jail on 3 November 1975.

The massacre happened barely three months after anti-liberation elements assassinated Father of the Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and most of his family members on 15 August 1975.