Dhaka-Delhi Ties Are of Friendship, Not Slavery: Quader

Awami League Secretary-General and Minister for Road Transport and Bridges Obaidul Quader said Bangladesh's alliance with India is friendship, not slavery.

“We don’t forget our national interest in maintaining relations with India. India was a genuine friend in our liberation war,” he said while handing over the party’s membership forms and copies of the party constitution to the AL leaders of Kurigram and Cumilla districts at the Awami League president’s Dhanmondi political office here.

Quader said Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi will join the celebration of Mujib Year as a representative of India.

Those who are opposing Modi’s visit to Dhaka have been behaving with India like slaves, he said.

The AL Secretary-General said that when BNP President Khaled Zia was Prime Minister, she visited India but failed to discuss the issue of water during her tour.

But, he said, the BNP leaders are now behaving like slaves to satisfy the Indian leaders.

He added that those who oppose Modi’s visit are opposing the Mujib Year.

Directing the grassroots leaders of the AL not to make party members militant, racial and anti-liberation groups, he said, "Be vigilant so that extortionists, land grabbers, opium dealers and abusers can not be members of the AL."

AL Presidium Members Matia Chowdhury and Jahangir Kabir Nanak, His Organizing Secretary Mirza Azam, Secretary of Social Welfare Sujit Nandi Roy, Office Secretary Barrister Biplab Barua, Secretary of Science and Technology Engr Abdus Sabur and Deputy Secretary of State Sayem Khan were among others present.