Online Desk: Criticizing BNP’s call to boycott Indian products, Foreign Minister Hasan Mahmud on Sunday said the cooperation between Bangladesh and India must be maintained in the greater interest of the people.

“India is a friendly country to Bangladesh. India stood beside us during our War of Liberation in 1971. Our relationship with India is multifaceted. We share borders with India. We are supportive to each other,” he told reporters at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs while responding to a question.

Hasan, also Awami League joint general secretary, said they need to ensure further development and progress in the region through cooperation with India. “Maintaining a warm relationship with India, we have to change the fate of the people.”

The Foreign Minister wanted to know why there were such boycott calls from the BNP during Ramadan and ahead of the biggest festival – Eid.

He reiterated that the main objective of BNP’s call to boycott Indian products is to destabilise the country’s market and increase prices of essentials so that people suffer.

“You will eat onions that come from India, your leader will wear sarees from India, your field-level female leaders will also wear Indian sarees, you will eat iftar that has beef that comes from India, you will go to India for medical treatment, and you call for boycott of Indian products — these are nothing but hypocrisy. The real objective of BNP is to increase the price of products by destabilising the market in the country,” Hasan said in Chattogram on Saturday.

The foreign minister said that BNP leader Ruhul Kabir Rizvi has burnt his shawl along with those who called for a boycott of Indian products. “Actually, I don’t know if the shawl was bought from India or from Bangabazar.”

Responding to a question regarding legal steps by BNP against Hasan for his remarks, the foreign minister said, “Let them take legal steps, I am ready to face that. In fact, it is not a legal issue.”