Staff Correspondent:

The BNP has filed two cases at Paltan Model Police Station accusing 30 police personnel, including former inspector general Chowdhury Abdullah Al Mamun and former Detective Branch chief Harunor Rashid, of ‘looting and robbery in the name of a police raid’ on the BNP’s central offices in Naya Paltan in two separate incidents.

One case is over an incident that occurred in 2022, while the other is over an incident during the recent student-led mass movement against the Awami League government.

Salah Uddin Khan, the party’s case information and preservation officer, filed the complaints at the police station on Wednesday morning. The complaints were accepted by Sentu Mia, the police station’s chief.

Afterwards, Salah Uddin told reporters: “As you know, from 2009 to 2024, police officers filed many false cases, harassed us, and abducted us. I have recently brought complaints over an incident for 2022. Harunor Rashid, Mehedi Hasan and Biplab Kumar Sarkar broke down the door of our office, entered, and took away all our office belongings. Goods worth around Tk 4.7 million were robbed and goods worth Tk 350,000 were destroyed. We have filed an FIR Wednseday in a case relating to that.”

“The second is over an incident on Jul 16. On that day, the DB’s Harunor Rashid, DMP’s Mehedi Hasan, and Biplab Kumar Sarkar – they planted various illegal weapons and ammunition along with weapon-making tools and put them in the office of Ruhul Kabir Rizvi, senior joint secretary general of the party, and placed illegal bombs on the third floor. They staged a drama and stole various items. We have come with allegations that they placed illegal arms, ammunition, and bombs inside and then detonated bombs outside the office for intimidation. We spoke to duty officer SI Mizanur Rahman. Later OC Sentu Mia accepted the allegations.”

Several senior police officials were named in the cases.

According to the case report, the police entered the BNP’s central office in Naya Paltan and caused ‘looting and vandalism’ on Dec 8, 2022.

Fifteen people, including the former police chief, have been accused in this case.

The second case says that on Jul 16, 20-25 plainclothes policemen led by then DB chief Harunor Rashid entered the BNP office in Naya Paltan during the student-led mass movement while ‘armed Awami League cadres’ attempted to intimidate people with arms, ammunition, bamboo sticks, rods, and pistols. They ransacked the central office and planted illegal weapons inside to file cases against BNP leaders, the complaint read.

Apart from Harun, 16 officials of the DMP have been named in the case.