Nagorik Oikya convener Mahmudur Rahman Manna, whose two leaked phone calls created quite a stir across the country, was handed over to detectives by members of Rapid Action Battalion (Rab) early Wednesday.
The elite force members handed over Manna to the Detective Branch (DB) of Police at the DB headquarters in Dhaka around 12:30am, Nurul Alam, assistant commissioner of police in Gulshan zone told The Daily Star.
The duty officer at Gulshan Police Station told The Daily Star, Manna had been shown arrested in a case filed against him with the police station under Section 131 of Penal Code for allegedly inciting the armed forces.
Manna’s family yesterday afternoon filed a general diary with Banani Police Station hours after detectives denied picking him up.
Begum Sultana, a sister-in-law of Manna, stated in the GD that though a group of plainclothes men, identifying themselves as detectives, picked up Manna from a Banani residence but the Detective Branch of Police denied it. Manna is missing and his mobile phone is switched off since then, Sub-Inspector Farida Pervin of Banani police station quoted from the GD.
On Tuesday, Shahnama Sharmin, Manna’s niece told reporters that a group of plainclothes men, who introduced themselves as detectives, allegedly picked up Manna from her house on Road 17/A in Block-E of Banani.
“Around 3:00am, a group of people knocked at the door. They said they are from the Detective Branch,” Manna’s niece told reporters.
DB police however denied detaining Manna.
While leaving the place around 3:30am, the plainclothesmen told the insiders that they would take Manna to their office, she added.
But hours later, the detectives denied picking up Manna. “We didn’t detain him,” DB Joint Commissioner Monirul Islam said at a press briefing.
Meanwhile, BNP has expressed its astonishment as police denied picking up Manna.
“We are stunned that the law enforcers have denied picking up Manna,” Salahuddin Ahmed, joint secretary general of BNP, said in a press statement on Tuesday afternoon.
BNP expressed strong condemnation over the incident and demanded information regarding Manna’s whereabouts immediately.
“We want to get Manna back to his family immediately and demand punishment to the people behind the incident,” the statement added.