Awami League General Secretary and Road Transport and Bridges Minister Obaidul Quader said on Tuesday that the dispute over allocating space for BNP’s rally on December 10 will be resolved soon.

“A problem surfaced over the venue for BNP’s December 10 rally and there is no solution yet,” he said while talking to reporters after a meeting with newly appointed Indian High Commissioner to Bangladesh Pranay Kumar Verma at the Secretariat.

Replying to a question, the minister said “I am always optimistic, and I am optimistic over it. Whatever the situation is, a solution will come out.”

Read more: BNP to avoid AL's trap over December-10 rally: Gayeshwar

 “There is no reason for the people to panic. On behalf of my party, I want to say that we are in power, why would we want to create any unrest? Why will we do something that could create panic? We don’t need that,” he said.

 

“Now, if anybody attacks us, if there is any instigation, if they jump on us, will we sit idle? We hope the opposition will hold their rally peacefully,” he said.

Referring to the visit of the Indian High Commissioner, Quader said “There are many projects under road communication , and we have discussed the progress of the projects. We also discussed the Teesta issue. In reply to the Teesta issue, he said he will try his best (to resolve it).”

On September 27, BNP announced a series of public rallies in 10 divisional cities. The party will conclude the divisional programmes by holding its last rally in Dhaka on December 10.

Police in Dhaka have asked BNP to hold the rally at Suhrawardy Udyan, but BNP is determined to dol its rally in front of its party headquarters at Naya Paltan in Dhaka.

Read more: December-10 rally: BNP delegation sits with IGP

The BNP has long been demanding that the next general election be held under a caretaker government, not under any political government--a demand sharply rejected by the ruling Awami League as the constitution does not contain any such provision.