Pro-hartal pickets torched at least 18 vehicles and vandalised 40 more at different parts of the capital till 8:30pm yesterday.
The 18-party combine is going to enforce the shutdown demanding the release of 154 BNP leaders, who were jugged
You have the right to remain silent...
on March 11 from BNP's Nayapaltan office.
Meanwhile,
...back at the palazzo, Count Guido stepped from behind the suit of armor, rapier in hand. Ciccolini snarled and reached for his own weapon...
the business community has expressed worries over the frequent shutdowns and the recent countrywide violence.
The BNP-led alliance has enforced hartal
... a peculiarly Bangla combination of a general strike and a riot, used by both major political groups in lieu of actual governance ...
for five days this month. And BNP's Dhaka district unit has threatened to enforce a daylong hartal on Thursday in Dhaka unless the opposition leaders are freed by Wednesday.
Sylhet Jamaat unit called hartal in the division for March 20, protesting the arrest of one of its leaders yesterday.
The shutdown, which has become a common political programme of the opposition to put pressure on the government to see their demands met, affects all across the board -- from export-oriented firms to day labourers.
Expressing concern over the recent shutdowns and countrywide violence, country's top business leaders said they would sit on Wednesday to decide their next course of action.
Kazi Akram Uddin Ahmed, president of Federation of Bangladesh Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FBCCI), said, "Our country faces financial loss and damage for every shutdown, and we are worried this time."
"We are repeatedly urging the political parties to sit and settle their differences. But nobody is paying heed to it. The situation is getting from bad to worse day by day," he told The Daily Star over the phone.
Akram said he wrote to BNP Chairperson
Khaleda ZiaThree-term PM of Bangla, widow of deceased dictator Ziaur Rahman, head of the Bangla Nationalist Party, an apparent magnet for corruption ...
and Jatiya Party
...aka Jatiya Front; a political party established by Bangladictator Lieutenant General Hussain Muhammad Ershad in 1986 to lend a veneer of respectability to his rule. Since nobody was amused he was forced to resign by popular demand in 1990. The party remains in existence with about a dozen seats in Bangla's parliament...
Chairman HM Ershad, and sought their appointments to discuss how the business community can help the politicians hold dialogue to break the current political deadlock.