Some 377 Ansar members have been held and whisked to jail after clashes with student-people vigilantes on Sunday night after government Secretariat gatecrash, witnesses and officials said.
A Dhaka court Monday sent the auxiliary law-enforcers, including two female members, to jail in four cases filed over the clashes and forced entry into the government's administrative headquarters.
Dhaka Metropolitan Magistrate Md Saifur Rahman passed the orders after police produced them before the court "seeking their confinement in jail", said a sub-inspector posted at the court.
Earlier in the day, the Ansar members were produced before the Chief Metropolitan Magistrate's Court of Dhaka in the cases filed with Shahbagh, Ramna, Airport and Paltan police stations.
A total of 191 Ansar members were sent to jail in the case filed with Shahbagh Police station, 85 in the case filed with Ramna Police station, six in the Airport Police Station case and 85 in the case filed with Paltan Police Station.
Sub-Inspector Saifur Rahman, also General Register Officer (GRO) for the cases of Shahbagh and Ramna Police stations, Sub-Inspector Mozaffar, also GRO for the cases of Airport Police Station, and SI Md Alamgir Hossain, also GRO for the Paltan Police Station, confirmed the court proceedings to the FE correspondent.
Despite assurances from the current interim government-installed through a student-mass uprising early this month---of fulfilling their demands, a section of Ansar members Sunday continued demonstrating by blocking the Secretariat gates with officials and employees hemmed in daylong.
Clashes erupted as students and people came to disperse the demonstrators. At least 50 people were injured in the evening chaos.
"The clashes broke out around 9:20pm as students and other people tried to drive away the demonstrators demanding nationalisation of their jobs," says an eyewitness account of the scenes.
The situation turned violent after hundreds of students and others, many of them equipped with sticks, went to the Secretariat after hearing that Ansar members blocked the Secretariat even after getting assurance of fulfilling their demands, the witnesses said.
Shortly after the clash with the students in and outside the Secretariat, the government on Sunday night issued an order transferring nine senior officials, including one deputy commandant, of the Ansar and VDP to new postings.
A gazette notification, signed by Fouzia Khan, deputy secretary at Ansar Section-1 of Public Security Division under the Ministry of Home Affairs, was issued to this effect, says a UNB report.
Deputy Commandant Md Nurul Hasan Faridi was transferred to the battalion's Khulna range from Gazipur's Safipur with the rank of deputy director (DD).
Eight deputy directors were removed from their current workplaces.
DD Md Saifullah Russell was transferred to Dhaka headquarters (operations) from Chattogram range. Shah Ahmad Fazle Rabbi to Rajshahi from Khulna, Mohammad Abdul Awal to Mymensingh from Sylhet, Kamrun Nahar to Gazipur's Safipur from Rajshahi, Dr Md Saifur Rahman to Chattogram from Mymensingh, Md Ashraful Alam to Dhaka range from Barishal and Md Ziaul Hasan to Sylhet from Dhaka range.
In the wake of waves of demonstrations by different groups to press their demands-at a time when the interim government has yet to set in-the Dhaka Metropolitan Police imposed restrictions on gatherings around the secretariat and the Chief Adviser office.
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