Abdul Latif Siddiqui, an independent candidate for Tangail-4, yesterday fell sick as he continued his fast unto death for the second consecutive day protesting the attack on his motorcade on Sunday.

After the attack, Latif demanded arrest of the attackers and withdrawal of the officer-in-charge of Khalihati Police Station in the district.

A two-member medical team, led by Tangail Civil Surgeon Dr Sharif Hossain, visited Latif around 11:00am yesterday and requested him to get admitted to a hospital.

But Latif refused either to go to a hospital or take saline. He said, “I will not withdraw my strike until my demands are met.”

After conducting a medical check-up, Sharif told The Daily Star that Latif had acute dehydration and his heart rate was decreasing.

He could catch pneumonia due to the cold. He needs to be taken to hospital immediately, the doctor added.

He is a patient of diabetes, asthma, heart disease and high blood pressure, said Latif's nephew Mosharraf Hossain Siddiqui.

“My uncle has not eaten anything since Sunday morning,” Mosharraf added.

Latif is not only a politician     but also an organiser of the Liberation War, said Latif's wife Laila Siddiqui after meeting the returning officer (RO).

He is staging the protest because he felt insulted after criminals attacked his motorcade, she added.

"The demands for withdrawing the officer-in-charge of Kalihati Police Station and arresting the attackers are not the demands of Latif only, these are the demands of Kalihati's mass people," she added.

Menwhile, Officer-in-Charge of Kalihati Police Station Mosharraf Hossain said three alleged attackers, including Salauddin Talukdar, son of incumbent upazila parishad chairman, were arrested in the evening.

Later in the day, a three-member medical team -- led by Dr Mofazzal Hossain, senior consultant (cardiology) of Tangail General Hospital -- was formed to monitor Latif's health condition following the RO's directive.

Contacted, RO Md Shahidul Islam said he had informed the Election Commission about the latest situation.

"The Electoral Inquiry Committee, comprising judicial magistrates, has also submitted its probe report to the Election Commission over the incident," he added.

A journalist has been arrested in Khulna in a case filed under the Digital Security Act for publishing “false” information on the number of votes cast in a constituency during Sunday's polls.

Hedayet Hossain Mollah, local correspondent of the Dhaka Tribune, was arrested yesterday, a day after the case was filed against two reporters, including him, with Batiaghata Police Station in the district.

The other accused is Rashidul Islam, staff reporter of the daily Manab Zamin, reports our correspondent in Khulna.

According to the initial announcement of the election results, the number of votes cast in Khulna-1 was higher than the total number of voters in the constituency. As the matter was brought to the returning officer's attention, he said it was a mistake and later came up with a correction, said local journalists.

By the time the correction could be made, the two media outlets ran reports saying the number of votes cast was around 22,000 higher than the actual number of voters, they said.

Documents provided by the returning officer's office showed 45,000 of the 2,59,420 voters did not cast their ballots.

Batiaghata Upazila Nirbahi Officer Debashish Chowdhury, also the assistant returning officer, filed the case against the two journalists.

The case statement said the accused published false, fabricated and provocative information on the voting with the use of electronic devices, including laptops, which might confuse people and create a chaotic situation.

Such activities made the “fair election” questionable, the statement said.

Mahabubur Rahman, officer-in-charge of Batiaghata Police Station, told The Daily Star that they arrested Hedayet near Gallamary Bridge in connection with the case.

However, several witnesses said the journalist was picked up near Picture Palace intersection in the city when he was returning home from the Khulna Press Club.

Hedayet's wife Sayida Laila Akhter told this newspaper that she called her husband over the phone but another man picked it up and introduced himself as the OC of the police station.

“Last night, the returning officer had requested my husband to apologise for the news. Otherwise, he said my husband would face action,” she said.

Despite repeated attempts, the RO could not be reached over the phone for comments.

Handcuffed, Hedayet was produced before a district court which sent him to jail.

Meanwhile, a former deputy secretary of the Election Commission has been picked up by detectives in the city's Agargaon area for “leaking information on the election”.

Shamsul Alam was allegedly collecting election results submitted to the commission from across the country and sending those to “others”, said police and EC sources.

He was picked up near the Nirbachan Commission office on Monday night, they said.

GG Biswas, officer-in-charge of Sher-e-Bangla Nagar Police Station, said the official was kept at the DB office on Mintoo Road.

Abdul Baten, additional commissioner (detectives) of the Dhaka Metropolitan Police, said they picked up Shamsul for interrogation. 

Almost 82 percent of the lawmakers for the 11th parliament have assets worth more than Tk 1 crore, civil society platform Shushashoner Jonno Nagorik (Shujan) said in a report yesterday.

Of those MPs, 32 percent have assets worth more than Tk 5 crore, according to the report unveiled at the Dhaka Reporters Unity in the capital.

According to finance ministry sources, only 0.06 percent of the total population of Bangladesh was valued at more than Tk 1 crore in 2016.     

“The wealthier candidates were elected,” Dilip Kumar Sarkar, Shujan's central coordinator, said while presenting the report.

In terms of income, 27 percent of the MPs have an income of over Tk 1 crore, 18 percent between Tk 50 lakh and 1 crore, 29 percent between Tk 25 lakh and 50 lakh and 17 percent between Tk 5 lakh and Tk 25 lakh.

Only five percent of the lawmakers had an income between Tk 2 and Tk 5 lakh while 1.34 percent of them had an income of less than Tk 2 lakh.

The report also mentioned that 1.34 percent of the MPs had not submitted their wealth statements in their affidavits.

It further showed that 61 percent of the next parliament is made up of businessmen and their number in the Jatiya Sangsad was increasing.

Additionally, 13 percent are lawyers, five percent servicemen, four percent farmers and the rest belonged to different professions.

It is a dangerous sign that the county's politics is going into the hands of businessmen and wealthy people, Shujan Secretary Badiul Alam Majumdar said at the programme.

Political analysts have said the major political parties' dependency on businessmen had effectively turned the politics into a business.

Lawyers, businessmen and farmers were the three most common occupations of the lawmakers elected to the country's first parliament in 1973.

Of the MPs in that parliament, 31 percent were lawyers and only 18 percent were businessmen.

However, in the fifth parliament, constituted through the election of 1991, businessmen outnumbered lawyers, with 38 percent being businessmen and 15 percent lawyers.

After the 2008 polls, 57 percent of the lawmakers elected were businessmen, which rose to 59 percent by 2014.

On a more positive note, Badiul Alam said it was a good sign that educated and taxpaying citizens were being elected as MPs.

The Shujan report shows that 43 percent of the new MPs hold post graduate degrees, 38 percent hold graduate degrees, 12 percent have passed the HSC exams and three percent were SSC graduates.

Only four percent did not pass the SSC exam.

It also said that seven percent of the lawmakers were now facing at least one case, while 45 percent had cases filed against them in the past.

The Supreme Court today stayed till November 17 a High Court order that granted bail to former textiles and jute minister Abdul Latif Siddique in a case against him on charge of misusing power in selling a government property.

The apex court passed the order following a petition filed by the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) seeking stay on the HC order.

Also read: Latif Siddique gets 6-month bail in graft case

A four-member bench of Appellate Division of the SC headed by Chief Justice Syed Mahmud Hossain also asked the ACC to file a leave to appeal petition with this court by November 17 challenging the HC order.

ACC’s lawyer Advocate Khurshid Alam Khan told the Daily Star that Abdul Latif Siddique cannot get released from jail following the SC order.

Advocate Munsurul Hoque Chowdhury appeared for Abdul Latif Siddique.

On November 4, the High Court granted the six-month bail to Latif Siddique and also issued a rule asking the ACC and the government to explain why he should not be granted permanent bail in this case.

ACC Assistant Director Aminul Islam lodged the case with Adamdighi Police Station in Bogura on October 10, 2017. Jahanara Rashid, wife of late Harunur Rashid, was also made accused in the case.

According to the case statement, Jahanara Rashid leased a piece of land in Adamdighi upazila -- owned by Bangladesh Jute Corporation -- for three years at Tk 1.2 lakh per year on May 13, 2010.

In spite of getting repeated orders from the textiles and jute ministry to pay rent for the land, Jahanara applied to the ministry to purchase the land on November 13, 2011.

The then textiles and jute minister Latif Siddique, without floating any formal tender, sold the land to Jahanara at Tk 23.94 lakh although its market price was Tk 64.63 lakh.

Following the incident, the ACC filed the case against Latif and Jahanara under the Penal Code and section 5(2) of the Anti-Corruption Commission Act 1947.

On June 20 this year, a Bogura court sent Latif Siddique to jail in the case, rejecting his bail petition.