A political party is planning election engineering: BNP’s Mahdi Amin

Mahdi Amin, BNP Election Management Committee spokesperson and adviser to the party chairperson, has said a political party is systematically preparing for election engineering ahead of the upcoming national polls.

Speaking at a press conference today (7 February) at the committee office in Gulshan, Mahdi said recent incidents indicate an organised attempt to manipulate the electoral process, citing the recovery of six illegal voting seals in Lakshmipur as evidence of a broader conspiracy to influence the election.

Mahdi said, "A printing press owner arrested over the seizure confessed in court that the seals were made on the instruction of a Jamaat-e-Islami leader. Preliminary investigations found WhatsApp order details, seized materials, and evidence of close links with a candidate. This is an effort to undermine the polls. All involved should be brought under the law."

He further said that BNP has received information from across the country that large numbers of burqas and niqabs have been prepared to facilitate fake voting by exploiting religious sentiments.

Calling for strong action by the Election Commission, Mahdi urged adequate deployment of female polling officers in women's booths and strict enforcement of voter identification as per the law. 

He said women must be identified by female officials with faces uncovered, as required for NID or Hajj photos, and stressed that all parties should appoint female polling agents to ensure transparency and credibility.

He said the same political party had previously gone door to door collecting NID numbers and bKash account details, raising concerns about possible fake voting, and claimed BNP received information about preparations to print additional ballot papers.

Referring to another incident, he said law enforcement recently recovered 152 cricket stumps during a raid at a leader's residence in Sutrapur, Old Dhaka, questioning whether this indicates preparations for election violence and calling for heightened vigilance.

He also raised concerns over irregularities in the appointment of election observers, alleging that several approved organisations have links to a particular political party. 

He cited the People's Association for Social Advancement (PASA), which received approval to deploy the most domestic observers. Out of 55,454 local observers nationwide, PASA alone was allocated 10,559, and media reports show it operates from a single room in a Habiganj village house with only one staff member.