Dr Kamal Hossain will not join the Jatiya Oikya Front’s Rajshahi rally today due to illness, confirmed Gana Forum General Secretary, Mostafa Mohsin Montu.

The Jatiya Oikya Front’s divisional rally is supposed to be held today, Friday (Nov 9), at the Rajshahi madrasa field.

Sources say though Dr Kamal will be absent, Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir, Mahmudur Rahman Manna, ASM Abdur Rab, Col Oli Ahmed, Andalib Rahman Partho, Mirza Abbas, Goyeshwar Chandra Roy and other senior leaders will take part.

Rajshahi city BNP president Mosaddek Hossain Bulbul said: “we got the permission for rally only fourteen hours before and completed all the necessary formalities.”

Our workers and activists are being blocked at every step to foil the rally, he alleged.

“Bus service is being stopped, posters and banners are being torn and some overzealous police officers are behaving impolitely.”

The police are arresting workers, activists and intimidating them, added the BNP leader and said defiantly: “no malicious strategy will work because this will be the biggest rally ever seen.”