Nur, Rashed sued over Gono Odhikar Parishad office

The owner of Pritam-Zaman Tower, has started a case against 17 people, including the Gono Odhikar Parishad leaders Nurul Haque Nur and Md Rashed Khan for vandalising his property.

Mia Mashiuzzaman in the case identified 17 named suspects and about 75 to 80 unnamed others and accused them of illegally entering an office in the building, damaging the iron gate, wooden door, and CCTV cameras, and making threats, said Paltan Police Station chief Md Salauddin. The total damages are estimated at Tk 60,000.

Nur signed a monthly rental agreement for a 2,600 square feet office on the tower‍‍`s fifth floor on Mar 1, 2022, and has been using it as the central office for the Gono Odhikar Parishad since then, according to the case filed with Paltan Police Station.

Mashiuzzaman claimed he recently learned from various sources and the media about Nur‍‍`s associations with different local and foreign organisations and individuals and that it could pose a threat to national security.

He claimed they had not paid rent for 16 months, breaching the rental agreement, and he issued them a written notice to vacate the office.

Enraged by the vacate notice, Nur threatened to occupy the office and not vacate it, which proliferated on various media outlets.

Mashiuzzaman installed an iron collapsible gate and hung a new lock outside the office on Thursday, between 10:30 am to 11 am.

The commercial space’s owner said that Nur‍‍`s men broke the lock he had installed on the property and entered the office without permission in the afternoon while the police tried to mediate between the two parties.

He would occupy the office for the next six months, Nur said in a press conference outside the tower on Friday afternoon.

Both Nur and Mashiuzzaman admitted that the retired Bangladesh Army colonel backed away from the party’s activities following the recent clashes over the party leadership between Nur and Reza Kibria, the party’s former convener.

Since then, Mashiuzzaman has pushed for monthly payments from the party to cover the rent for the space at Pritam-Zaman Tower.