Online Desk: Thousands of leaders and activists of BNP and its associate bodies have gathered in front of the party’s Nayapaltan central office to attend the grand rally today to mount pressure on the government to accept their one-point demand.

BNP activists started gathering in front of the party’s Nayapaltan headquarters this morning amid the presence of a huge number of law enforcers.

Defying the senior leaders’ instructions, several thousand opposition activists thronged Nayapaltan on Friday afternoon in advance and stayed there overnight.

Visiting the rally venue around 9 am today, thousands of opposition activists were seen coming from different parts of the city.

Wearing colourful caps, carrying banners, festoons, placards and portraits of the party’s top leaders, they were shouting anti-government slogans as they converged on the venue.

The roads and alleys stretching from Kakrail to Arambagh are filled to the brim with BNP activists, halting traffic in the area.

Many leaders and activists of the party alleged that they had to face checking and barricades by law enforcers at the entry points and several locations in Dhaka while presence of buses on the streets was very thin.

BNP’s Dhaka north and south city units are organizing the rally to press home the opposition’s one-point demand for holding the upcoming national election under a non-party government.

The rally is scheduled to formally begin at 2 pm with BNP’s Dhaka south city unit convener Abdus Salam in the chair.

BNP Secretary General Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir will address the programme as the chief guest.

Apart from BNP, other like-minded political parties and alliances have also made preparations to arrange separate rallies in different parts of the city to press home the one-point demand.

The ruling Awami League is also scheduled to hold a rally in front of the south gate of Baitul Mukarram mosque, which is 1.7 km away from BNP’s rally at Nayapaltan.

After taking much time, Dhaka Metropolitan Police (DMP) finally gave Awami League and BNP permission on Friday evening to hold their rallies in the capital’s Baitul Mukarram’s South Gate and Nayapaltan respectively on 20 conditions.