Dhaka, Mar 10 (UNB)-Jamaat today said scores of its activists and leaders arrested on fictitious charge and demanded their unconditional release before the Independence Day on March 26.

Party’s secretary general Ali Ahsan Mohammad Mujahid told a press conference that those arrested were subjected to physical and mental torture in police custody.

He said more than 700 Jamaat and Shibir men have been arrested on false pretext since the incident on Rajshahi University campus on February 8.

He termed ‘injustice and undemocratic’ the actions against the leaders of Jamaat and its student wing Chhatra Shibir. They are creating obstacles in holding public meetings and rallies. It is a planned action to annihilate the Islamic forces of the country, he said.

Mujahid announced a countrywide programme from March 14 to 31 when they will hold meetings and rallies to expose the ‘misdeeds’ of the government and injustice and undemocratic actions against the party activists and leaders.

He alleged that the government is violating the human rights by extracting confessional statement under duress from the arrested the Jamaat-Shibir activists. “The government is using the law enforcing agencies to harass the political opponents”.

Referring to the CHT incidents, Mujahid said it was the result of withdrawal of Army camps. But the government is falsely blaming the political adversaries.

The Jamaat leader regretted that a section of the media toeing the line of government has been dishing out falsehood against the party and its leaders.

He dismissed the accusation of repression of women by Jamaat made by Awami League general secretary Syed Ashraful Islam.