Violent clashes mark day-long hartal

Violent clashes in Dhaka city and elsewhere in the country marked countrywide dawn-to-dusk hartal (strike) enforced by Islamic Law Implementation Committee Monday. The call for hartal was given earlier by Mufti Fazlul Haq Amini, chairman of a faction of the Islami Oikya Jote (IOJ) and also chief of the committee on March 08 protesting the proposed National Women Development Policy giving women equal rights to paternal property. The organisers of shutdown termed the policy anti-Islamic. Dozens of people were detained and scores others injured in the city during the hartal. In Narayanganj, over 100 people including policemen, were injured in clashes between hartal supporters and the law enforcers.Our correspondent based in Chittagong said the pro-hartal pickets vandalised about 100 buses and other vehicles and beat up about 30 people at Chittagong Hathajari road around noon. In Dhaka city, 10,000 police personnel wearing bullet-proof vests and helmets charged batons to disperse the protesters who tried to bring out processions at several points. The pro-strike elements, mostly madrassa students, under the banner of Islamic Law Implementation Committee blockaded roads and highways, urging the government what they said not to pass laws against the Quoranic injunction. Control room of Dhaka Metropolitan Police (DMP) said they arrested 125 people from various city areas during the hartal hours on charge of their involvement in violence. "The strike was mostly peaceful in the capital as they stepped up security to avoid any trouble," a senior DMP official said, adding that they charged batons on the violent picketers only to maintain law and order in the overpopulated city. Police also used tear gas shells and water cannons at Signboard area to disperse hundreds of pro-strikers who barricaded Dhaka-Chittagong Highway, which connects the country's prime seaport with the capital. At least ten protesters were injured during the chase and counter chase, which had turned the area into a veritable battlefield. The injured were given first aid. The strikers alleged that police fired rubber bullets on them and arrested at least 30 people when they were staging the demonstration peacefully. But law enforcers deployed at the area rejected the allegation. They said that 15 picketers were picked up from the spot. Clashes were reported from the city's Shantinagar, Paltan, Lalbagh, Kamrangirchar, Kakrail, Mohammadpur, Mirpur and Ramna areas. Most of the shops, schools and colleges were shut during the hartal hours while inter-district transport came to a halt and most of the launches and ferries remained moored at the terminals. Railway and Biman authorities claimed their services remained uninterrupted. Banks kept their doors open but transaction was thin. Trading at the country's two bourses took place. But transaction there was also thin. A senior officer of the Motijheel branch of Islami Bank Bangladesh Ltd told the FE that they opened the shutter of the bank but the number of clients were thin. A number of buses, minibuses and a few private cars were seen plying the roads at noon. Rickshaws in the city plied as usual. Meanwhile, activists of Bangladesh Chhatra League, a student wing of the ruling party, also brought out anti-strike procession in the capital. The cabinet on March 07 approved the National Women Development Policy 2011 with a provision of equal share of women in parental property and their opportunity in employment and business. Our Correspondent from Chittagong adds: Traffic movement, which was thin due to general strike, remained suspended in the afternoon following clashes. Two inter-district routes of Rangamati and Khagrachhari hill districts connect Chittagong through the Hathazari Road. The buses carrying devotees for on-going Maizbhander Orash Sharif at Fatikchhari of north Chittagong suspended their journey fearing attack by pickets and parked beside the road from the city's Oxygen intersection to Chowdhury Hat in the morning. At around 12.30 pm several hundred students from Hathazari Baro Madrasha, who earlier gathered between Oxygen and Baluchara area put up barricade on the road, chanted slogans against the proposed Women Development Policy 2011 and damaged the stationary vehicles. Eyewitnesses said the attackers while damaging the buses with wooden sticks said why the people were going to Maizbhander Orash because it was anti-Islamic. "They were from the local Islami Chhatra Shibir, student wing of Jamaat-e-Islami," said Nur Uddin, a local shopkeeper at Baluchara area on the road. As many as 30 people including children received minor injuries during the attack, locals said adding that the pro-hartal pickets have also set a petrol filling station on fire at the Baluchara area. Hathazari police said they dispersed the pickets with blank fires and using teargas shells and brought the situation under control as people from the locality also chased away the Madrasha students from the road and adjoining areas. Meanwhile, about two hundred students from Patiya Baro Madrasha and West Patiya Jiri Madrasha put up barricade on the Chittagong-Patiya-Cox's Bazar Road at around 12.00 pm although traffic was almost normal from the morning. The pro-hartal pickets also damaged some vehicles on the Chittagong-Patiya Road and put up barricades at different point. Activities in the port remained normal as the workers loaded and unloaded cargoes in 28 vessels in the berths and outer anchorage. Cargoes were also delivered from the port to other destinations without any interruption, said secretary of Chittagong Port Authority Syed Farhad Uddin. Four vessels entered the port jetties while six others left, he added. UNB adds: In Mirpur, about 1,000 Islamist activists took to the street from Mirpur section 14 and marched towards section 10 when pro-government transport workers attacked the procession and dispersed it. Police nabbed 2-3 pro-hartal elements from the spot. At Kakrail and Malibagh, police charged batons on pro-hartal pickets and dispersed them. Police used tear gas and rubber bullets to clear a road blockade put up by pro-hartal activists at Narayanganj Ring Road on Dhaka-Chittagong Highway on Monday that left at least 60 people injured while 17 people were arrested from the spot. Local madrasa students and teachers blockaded the road since early morning to enforce the hartal called by Islamic Law Implementation Committee to press the government for scrapping the women development policy that envisaged equal share of women on parental property. Witnesses said police from Dhaka and Narayanganj swung into action simultaneously to remove the blockade at about 11:15 pm. As the pro-hartal pickets put up resistance, law enforcers charged batons, used around 50 tear gas canisters and several rounds of rubber bullets. Several policemen were also injured in the melee. After the police action, the traffic movement through the highway started returning to normal. In Narayanganj, students of different madrasas including Deobhog madrasa brought out processions in the morning in support of the hartal. When police obstructed them they pelted brick bats towards the law enforcers triggering a clash.