Former president AQM Badruddoza Chowdhury and his son BNP lawmaker Mahi B Chowdhury were also stopped at Banani on their way to the hospital.

Since yesterday evening, all people intending to visit Azad at the CMH were barred either from entering the cantonment area or proceeding beyond Shaheed Anwara School and College. There, many visitors, including opposition political leaders and journalists, left their vehicles and proceeded towards the CMH on foot. But authorities did not allow them beyond Senakunja without providing any reason.

Roads leading to the CMH were also made off-limits to traffic as long as the opposition leaders were inside the cantonment area.

Military Police stopped Awami League (AL) President Sheikh Hasina's vehicle at the intersection near the college inside the cantonment and asked her not to proceed any more. Hasina came down from her vehicle and walked all the way up to Shikha Anirban, where one Colonel Sayeed asked her not to proceed any further, saying the prime minister was scheduled to take the route shortly.

At that point, one of Hasina's personal security officers told her quoting Brigadier Masud, head of the CMH, that the prime minister was not coming over to the hospital that night. The AL chief then told the army officials that she intended and should be allowed to visit Prof Azad.

The officials tried to dissuade Hasina telling that she and other AL leaders including Obaidul Quader, Rahmat Ali and Faruq Khan just could not walk down the roads inside cantonment area. Hasina, however, defied them and walked for 50 minutes to cross the 4-km stretch to the CMH entrance.

There, again, the doors were closed on her face and the security staff denied her access into the hospital. A high official of the CMH came down to the entrance only to tell her that Prof Azad was in the Intensive Care Unit and she would better not see him.

The officer-in-charge of Cantonment Police Station appeared shortly at the scene and asked the opposition leader to hand over the photos taken by her personal cameraman inside the cantonment area. Hasina, furious, had a heated debate with the police officer but had to concede at the end.

Military Police also seized films and tapes of photojournalists and TV cameramen and kept reporters and camera crews of ntv, Channel i and ATN Bangla confined for some time.

On receiving the news that Hasina was stopped at the cantonment, frontline AL leaders, who had been gathering at the AL office at Dhanmondi for a scheduled meeting of the AL Central Working Committee (ALCWC), rushed towards the cantonment, only to be stopped by Military Police at different points.

AL leaders Sajeda Chowdhury, Mohiuddin Khan Alamgir, Abdul Latif Siddique MP and Abdur Razzak MP were stopped near Shaheed Anwara School and College; Abdul Jalil MP, Suranjit Sengupta MP and others near Senakunja and Asaduzzaman Noor MP, KM Jahangir MP and Shamsul Arefin Tutul at another military check post near by.

In a separate incident, AL leader SAMS Kibria MP was also denied access into the cantonment. His vehicle was stopped at Jahangir Gate.

Hasina and other opposition leaders left the cantonment area at 8:30pm, after which normal traffic resumed there.

Later, Sheikh Hasina chaired the ALCWC meeting that condemned the bar on visiting Azad. The meeting also decided to stage demonstrations in the city today and on March 1 across the country to protest the misbehaviour.