BNP joint secretary general Salahuddin Ahmed has allegedly been picked up by the law enforcers in plainclothes from a house in Uttara on Tuesday night since then his family and party colleagues have lost all their contacts with him.
However, police said they have no such information about taking away the BNP leader.
In a statement, BNP standing committee member Nazrul Islam Khan said they have come to know that Salahuddin along with two others staying with him was taken by a team of plainclothes police and RAB numbering 20 to 30 from a residence at Uttara in the city after 10:00pm on Tuesday.The family and his party colleagues have expressed their concern as he was not been produced before the court and even the law enforcers did not acknowledge that they taken him away, he said.
Khan mentioned that a caretaker of Salahuddin’s residence and two of his drivers were arrested without any arrest of warrants and they were produced before the court after three days.
“I was talking to my husband over cell phone. But, the line got disconnected abnormally around 10:8pm on Tuesday. Since then, we couldn’t contact him,” the BNP leader’s wife, Hasina Ahmed,journalists on Wednesday night.
She said that the owner of the Uttara house where Salahuddin had been staying informed her on Wednesday that a joint team of Rab and plainclothes police detained Salahuddin around 11.00 pm on Tuesday.
“Salauddin Ahmed is not available over phone since Tuesday night. The party high command and his family members have remained out of contact with him since last night,” BNP chairperson’s media wing member Sayrul Kabir Khan said.
He said that they believed Salahuddin was taken away because the government was annoyed with him as he had announced party programmes and issued press statements in following the arrest of another party joint secretary general Ruhul Kabir Rizvi Ahmed.
The BNP leader strongly condemned the manner in which opposition leaders like Salahuddin was picked up secretly and described it as illegal, arbitrary and autocratic.
He also demanded immediate release of Salahuddin and his two assistants. Deputy Commissioner (Media) of DMP Masudur Rahman told journalists, “We did not arrest him.”
Deputy director (Media) of RAB Maj Maksudul Alam said they are not aware of anything about taking away of Salahuddin Ahmed. – Staff Reporter
