Now BNP rejects polls result in Pabna municipality

The local leaders of BNP have rejected the December 30 poll result in Pabna municipality, two days after the ruling Awami League (AL) did the same.

Both the parties blamed the district administration and the police for acting in favour of independent candidate Kamrul Hassan Mintu, also the sitting mayor, although the election was generally acclaimed as an impartial and peaceful one.

Mintu won the election by bagging 30,547 votes against AL candidate Ragib Hassan Tipu's 24,654 votes and BNP candidate Nur Mohammad Masum Boga's 7,444 votes. 

The matter created tension among the local leadership of both AL and BNP.

“The independent candidate won the municipal polls on December 30 through election engineering with the help of the local administration. Our agents could not know the result at the centres,” Boga told the journalists in a press conference at Pabna Press Club yesterday.

Due to interference by the administration, BNP men could not go to the centres, he alleged.

President of Pabna district unit of BNP KS Mahmud chaired the press conference.

Earlier, AL's mayoral aspirant Ragib Hasan Tipu rejected the poll result.

Pabna district unit of AL in a press conference at their office on Thursday noon claimed that the local administration acted against the AL candidate to make the independent candidate winner. 

Demanding re-polling, his supporters also put barricade in Pabna bus terminal area, halting movement of vehicles for a couple of hours on Thursday afternoon.

Pabna Additional Deputy Commissioner Munshi Md Moniruzzaman, also the returning officer in the polls, termed the allegations baseless.