Chhatra Dal leaders deny conducting urine tests on aspiring leaders

Are political leaders – especially young leaders of tomorrow – required to be drug-free? BNP’s wing organisation Bangladesh Jatiyotabadi Chhatra Dal’s Boalmari upazila unit seems to think so. The upazila Chhatra Dal secretly conducted a urine test of eight candidates for its committee. According to locals, former MP and BNP’s central leader Shah Md Adu Jafar collected the urine and sent it to a diagnostic centre in Dhaka on Friday for analysis. When asked, the senior leader told the Dhaka Tribune that he was asked by central leaders of Chhatra Dal and women leaders in the district to usher in a new generation of pure leadership. “The next generation of leaders should not be addicted to marijuana, phensedyl or yaba, we cannot have drug addicts as leaders,” he said. But when the district Chhatra Dal unit President Benazir Ahmed Tabriz was asked, he denied knowing of any such matter. He said: “Abu Jafar has no right to interfere in anyone’s personal affairs, especially matters regarding bodily functions.” Chhatra Dal President Rajib Ahsan also denied of any such drug tests being taken. He called the test “fake news” and said a upazila unit has no right to elect members for a committee. He said: “We have no information about the committee and our student organisation has no systems regarding this manner.”