Following the arrest of former Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) A. K. M. Nurul Huda, now another CEC, Kazi Habibul Awal, has been taken into custody.
He was arrested on Wednesday by the Detective Branch (DB) of Dhaka Metropolitan Police from the Moghbazar area of the capital. A DB source has confirmed his arrest.
Kazi Habibul Awal was the thirteenth chief election commissioner of Bangladesh. He assumed the office of CEC on 27 February, 20222 and resigned on 5th September 2024.
Earlier, the BNP submitted a case application at Sher-e-Bangla Nagar police station accusing 24 individuals, including three former chief election commissioners, of conducting fraudulent elections.
The application also named the chief election commissioner of the 2024 national election, Kazi Habibul Awal.
The list included the name of Sheikh Hasina, then-prime minister who was ousted during the July uprising, former home minister Asaduzzaman Khan, former inspector general of police (IGP) Hassan Mahmood Khandker, and several other government officials.
Also accused are CEC KM Nurul Huda of the 2018 general elections, election commissioners Rafiqul Islam, Kabita Khanam, and Brigadier Shahadat Hossain Chowdhury.
Others named in the complaint include then-IGP Javed Patwary, then-Dhaka Metropolitan Police commissioner Benazir Ahmed, former IGP AKM Shahidul Hoque, former Special Branch (SB) chief Md Monirul Islam, and the former chiefs (unnamed) of the Directorate General of Forces Intelligence (DGFI) and National Security Intelligence (NSI), as well as former deputy inspector general (DIG) of Dhaka Range Police Syed Nurul Alam.