BNP keeps chair empty for chief guest Khaleda

BNP at its rally on Sunday had made that party’s now incarcerated Chairperson Khaleda Zia the chief guest.

The rally in Dhaka’s Suhrawardy Udyan was held between 2pm and 6pm.

Although Khaleda is in jail, serving five years in a corruption case, since February 8, the party, showing respect to her, left a chair empty at the centre of the stage to mark her absence during the rally.

The rally was organized to announce the party’s future course of action and strategy ahead of the 11th general election.

Apart from its plans, BNP placed a seven-point charter of demands, including the release of Khaleda Zia from jail and forming a neutral polls-time administration before the announcement of the election schedule, to the government.

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The party's other demands included dissolving the current parliament and Cabinet, creating a level-playing field by withdrawing all political cases and releasing all political prisoners, reconstitution of the Election Commission, deploying army and discarding electronic voting machines (EVMs) in the election.

A Dhaka court on February 8 had convicted Khaleda, a three-time former prime minister, and sent her to jail for five years in the Zia Orphanage Trust graft case.

She is currently kept at the old Dhaka central jail on Nazimuddin Road in Old Dhaka.

Since her imprisonment, BNP has been demanding her release claiming her conviction was politically motivated.