Police obstruct musical procession seeking voting rights
Writers, artistes, teachers and journalists had brought out a musical procession demanding voting rights and freedom of expression.
But the police obstructed the procession.
The incident took place on the road in front of the Institute of Engineers, Bangladesh (IEB) in the capital around 4:30pm on Friday.
The writers, artistes, teachers and journalists started the musical procession from Shahbagh around 4:00pm. The procession was supposed to travel from Shahbagh to Noor Hossain Chattar at Gulistan via the Matsya Bhaban intersection.
However, when the procession reached IEB in Ramna area, police blocked their way. Then at the face of the police obstruction, the musical procession ended right in front of the IEB.
Writer and researcher Rakhal Raha said, “We had been holding programmes with the demand of voting rights and freedom of expression for quite a few days.”
“With the same demand, we were carrying out a musical procession from Shahbagh to Noor Hossain Chattar today (Friday), as part of our pronounced programme. But, police obstructed the procession in front of the IEB,” he added.
He also said, “We are not carrying out a movement of clash with the police like the political parties. So, we were forced to end the procession right there in the face of police obstruction.”
On this matter, assistant commissioner of police in Ramna Zone Salman Farsi said, “There were different programmers going on in the Gulistan and the National Press Club areas. Any unwarranted incident could have happened, if they had moved ahead through so many programmes.”
“We had requested them to end the procession to maintain the law and order situation and the vehicular movement as usual. They kept our request,” he added.
The participants of the procession sang three different songs, ‘Karar Oi Louho Kobat’, ‘Ei shikol Pora Chol’ and ‘Durgomo Giri kantar Moru’. They played drums, dotora (a musical instrument having two strings) and guitar with the songs.
Artiste Farzana Wahid (Shayan), artiste Arup Rahi, journalist Mahbub Morshed, artiste Amal Akash, poet Ferdous Ara, organizer Baki Billah, artiste Bithi Ghosh, journalist Salah Uddin, artiste Dina Tajrin, actor Deepak Kumar Goswami and others participated in the procession.