BNP on Saturday started a three-hour token hunger strike in the city demanding its Chairperson Khaleda Zia's unconditional release from jail and her advanced treatment abroad.

The programme formally began around 11:21am in front of the party’s Nayapaltan central office through the recitation from the verses of the holy Quran.

As part of its countrywide programme, BNP’s Dhaka south and north city units arranged the programme in the capital where party senior leaders, including secretary general Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir, will deliver speeches.

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BNP leaders and activists holding banners, festoons and placards joined the programme and chanted slogans to have their chairperson permanently freed from jail.

The token hunger strike is scheduled to end around 2pm.

Besides, a similar programme is being held in all district towns and metropolitan cities across the country.

On Monday last, BNP held rallies across the country, including in front of its central office in the capital, to press the same demand.

BNP Chairperson Khaleda Zia, the 78-year-old former prime minister, has been undergoing treatment at Evercare Hospital in Dhaka under the supervision of a 15-member medical board, led by a specialist doctor, Professor Shahabuddin Talukder, since August 9.

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The medical board at a press conference recently recommended that she be urgently sent to a multidisciplinary center abroad soon as there are now no treatment options available for her in Bangladesh.

Khaleda has been suffering from various ailments, including liver cirrhosis, arthritis, diabetes, kidney, lung, heart, and eye problems.

On September 5, Khaleda’s brother Shamim Iskandar submitted an application to the government to take her abroad for treatment, but it was turned down.