BNP forbids cutting cakes on Khaleda’s birthday

Staff Reporter :

On the occasion of BNP Chairperson and former Prime Minister Begum Khaleda Zia’s 81st birthday, the BNP has announced programs of doa mahfils (prayer gatherings) at party offices and mosques across the country this Friday (August 15).

The announcement was made by the party’s Senior Joint Secretary General Ruhul Kabir Rizvi at a press conference held at the BNP Chairperson’s political office in Gulshan at 11:30 a.m. on Wednesday.

Rizvi urged leaders, activists, and the people of the country to pray for Khaleda Zia’s recovery. However, he stated that cutting cakes has been prohibited.

Khaleda was the third among five children of Taiyaba and Iskandar Majumdar, a businessman. She completed her government matriculation examination in 1960 and later studied at Surendranath College in Din?jpur.

In 1959, she married Ziaur Rahman, a prominent figure in the struggle for Bangladesh’s independence, then still part of Pakistan. During the Liberation War in 1971, she was placed under house arrest and showed little interest in politics, even after her husband assumed the presidency in 1977.

Following Ziaur Rahman’s assassination by military officers in 1981, she entered active politics and, in 1984, took over the leadership of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party.

Throughout the 1980s, Khaleda was arrested multiple times under the dictatorship of Hussein Mohammad Ershad. In 1991, she led the opposition to an electoral victory and became prime minister.