The BNP celebrated its Chairperson Khaleda Zia’s birthday at her Gulshan office this evening.

Khaleda Zia cut a total of five cakes, brought by leaders of the party’s different front and associate bodies on this occasion.

After cutting the cakes, Maruf Kamal Khan Sohel, press secretary to the party chief, told reporters: “Usually she [Khaleda] does not celebrate her birthday, but accepts the honour shown by her party men on this occasion.”

After cutting the cakes, leaders and activists offered a prayer there seeking wellbeing of Khaleda, her family members, her party men and the countrymen as well.

Several hundred leaders and activists of the party thronged her office to mark her 70th birthday which “coincides” with the National Mourning Day.

Khaleda Zia’s Gulshan office has been decorated with flowers and colourful lights and posters to celebrate the day.

From the beginning of this month, senior leaders of the ruling Awami League have been urging Khaleda Zia to refrain from celebrating her birthday on the National Mourning Day.

After assuming power in 1991, the BNP chief started celebrating her birthday on this day but she drew flak from different platforms, especially from the Awami League, for observing her birthday on August 15, which is the death anniversary of Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman.