2 Jubo League, BCL men held

Police yesterday picked up two leaders of Jubo League and Chhatra League after they scuffled with the law enforcers at Binodpur in Rajshahi city.

Protesting the police action, activists of the two organisations blocked the Rajshahi-Dhaka highway near Binodpur for around 15 minutes, said witnesses.

Police fired gunshots and tear gas to disperse them.

The two leaders are Mehedi Hasan Yamin, general secretary of city Jubo League's ward-30 unit and Ekhlasur Rahman Saddam, environment affairs secretary of the city BCL unit.

Witnesses alleged that the two leaders were trying to extort money from local mango trader Rakib around 12:30pm.

A scuffle broke out as Rakib refused to pay the two.

Seeing this, some policemen on duty at Rajshahi University's Binodpur gate went to the spot and tried to calm the three down, but got involved in a new scuffle with the two leaders.

At one stage, Yamin slapped a police constable, added witnesses.

Later, police detained Yamin and Saddam and took them to Motihar Police Station.

Talking to this correspondent, Sub-inspector Selim Reza, also the acting officer-in-charge of the police station, said the two scuffled with a police team and prevented the law enforcers from discharging their duties.

Quoting Yamin and Saddam, Reza said, Rakib had borrowed some money from Yamin and was dilly-dallying to return that. They had gone to the scene to talk to Rakib in this regard.

"Police did not find Rakib on the spot to have his statement," the police official said.

Iftekhair Alam, spokesperson for the Rajshahi Metropolitan Police, told The Daily Star that the two leaders were detained for interrogation.

According to him, Rakib is also a Jubo League leader.