Staff Correspondent

Traffic has resumed on Airport Road after the Armed Forces members who were dismissed or sent on compulsory retirement during the Awami League regime and their families blocked the Jahangir Gate area for two hours demanding the restoration of their jobs.

The Armed Forces personnel gathered around 8am and began a sit-in protest at 11am on Sunday under their platform “Shohojoddha,” with a three-point list of demands. Traffic came to a standstill due to their programme.

They cleared the street around 1pm after senior officers of the Armed Forces assured them their demands would be met. Traffic returned to normal after that.

The protest began around 9am and when the blocked the road, it halted traffic movement from the Chief Advisor's Office to Banani and also the exit and entry to the Cantonment. This led to heavy traffic congestion.

“The dismissed members of the Army, Navy and Air Force and their families took to the streets, bringing traffic to talk to them. We’re trying to talk to them and make them clear the area,” Mobarak Hossain, chief of Tejgaon Police Station said when the protest programme was on.

A severe traffic jam formed around the Jahangir Gate area due to the protest, said Tejgaon Traffic Additional Deputy Commissioner Tania Sultana. “The Crime Division of police and the Army are present at the scene. We’re trying to keep the traffic flow regular on the other roads.”

At one point, some army officers came to the scene from the Cantonment and spoke to the Sjohojoddha representatives trying to persuade them to end the protest.

Captain SM Enamul Hasan of the Bangladesh Navy spoke to the protesters around 1pm. He told the protesters that he had spoken to the high-ups in the Armed Forces and their demand would be met.

"Our discussion was fruitful and we spoke to them about your demands. They have given us a timeline. We'll try our best to fulfil your demands according to the timeline. We're quite sympathetic to you and would request you to leave the street.”

The protesters then left the street near the Jahangir Gate and went to the Shadhinata Bhaban instead.

"Our Sirs (senior officers) spoke to the three chiefs of the Armed Forces and assured us. They said that our demands will be materialised in five working days. We have to keep faith in the chiefs. Hence, we withdrew our blockade programme," said Shohojoddha Chief Coordinator Naimul Islam.

The group is pushing for a three-point list of demands:

1.Their jobs should be restored with their salaries and benefits due for the entire period of suspension order to now.

2.In case the job of an Armed Forces member could not be restored, they should be brought under the government pension scheme with full benefits

3. The structure of the law and the lopsided judicial system used to suspend hundreds of Armed Forces members should be reformed.

A former army member taking part in the protest said some army officers were the accomplices to the fascist Awami League government and misused their power to hold biased trials and dismissed hundreds of Army personnel.

These personnel were deprived of what they deserved and some of them were kept imprisoned in the “Ayna Ghor” detention cells and tortured inhumanly, he said.

Highlighting that British era law still existed in the Bangladesh Army, the protesters demanded reforms.

On Sept 15, suspended Armed Forces members submitted a memorandum to Chief Advisor Muhammad Yunus demanding their jobs back.

They allege they lost their jobs due to falling afoul of the former government at different times over the last 15 years.

The Armed Forces members said in the memorandum they were suspended over false accusations and without proof. Some of them were forced to resign for protesting illegal acts or for political reasons.

Earlier on Sept 8, more than 50 army members suspended during the Awami League’s rule held a human chain demonstration at the Jatiya Press Club demanding their jobs be restored with their arrears paid.