Countrywide since Wednesday the police have detained at least 10,000 people, mostly Awami League (AL) leaders and activists but also many innocent people.

With the government and the AL-led 14-party opposition combine apparently heading for a face-off, many fear violent clashes today at the entries to the city and inside, where about 1,200 people were arrested yesterday pushing the number of arrests in the last four days to the tune of 5,000.

Violence has already erupted in the city, with two passenger buses set on fire allegedly by opposition activists. One was set ablaze on Bangabandhu Avenue at about 6:25pm and the other in Motijheel after half an hour, but no casualty was reported.

The government, which termed the demonstration illegal, deployed a large number of law enforcers at the entries to the capital to prevent the demonstrators from entering it. The government last night also mobilised many a contingent of law enforcers from the adjacent districts to Dhaka.

But, the streams of marchers now camping at or proceeding to the scheduled five gathering points around the city have expressed irrevocable determination to march on defying all obstructions at 10:00am today and converge in the city's Paltan Maidan.

In many places on the way, the police obstructed transports carrying opposition men, vandalised podiums for rallies and arrested them in masses to foil the demonstration. There were reports of attacks on opposition processions by the police and ruling alliance cadres in a number of areas including Natore, where at least 50 opposition men were injured yesterday.

The police yesterday vandalised a podium in Rajbari where a stream of the opposition marchers was scheduled to hold a rally on its way to Dhaka.

The march from Mymensingh also faced police obstruction. The law enforcers stopped a number of buses carrying opposition men from Jamalpur and Sherpur to join the march from Mymensingh towards Dhaka.

BNP workers allegedly attacked the 14-party long march in Rajshahi, leaving 10 persons injured and a bus damaged when they halted in the northern district Friday night.

Our Chittagong correspondent reported that the police arrested 601 people in the port city and some other places in the district in the 24 hours until yesterday morning.

Besides, 67 people were held in Gazipur and 50 in Manikganj yesterday.

The police were acting as per the directives of a high-level home ministry meeting held on Wednesday night issued to the field-level officers to take every measure to stop the marchers from reaching the capital.

"The consequence of the repression on people will be serious," Leader of the Opposition Sheikh Hasina warned the government yesterday and called on the marchers to break through the government resistance and come to Paltan Maidan.

Sources said the government obstructions and police clampdown are forcing the opposition line-up to go for a tough agitation programme in retaliation that may include a two-day countrywide hartal this week. Awami League (AL) President Hasina is likely to announce the 48-hour hartal in her scheduled speech at the post-march rally in Paltan Maidan.

A mammoth gathering is expected in Paltan Maidan today in the 14-party combine's biggest-ever demonstration demanding an immediate resignation of the BNP-Jamaat-led coalition government.

People from almost every corner of the country started marching towards Dhaka led by senior leaders of the 14-party opposition on Tuesday. Braving an orchestrated harassment including 'mass arrest' and 'transport strike', the marchers moved on towards the capital chanting slogans like 'Let's move to Dhaka', 'Down with Khaleda' etc.

As of yesterday midnight, three of the five streams had already reached their scheduled points of convergence in Savar, Narsingdi and Tongi, while the remaining two from Comilla and Mawa were on their way to Sonargaon and Keraniganj.

According to the long march control room at the AL Bangabandhu Avenue central office, the marches from Narsingdi and Sonargaon will enter the city through Jatrabari, from Savar through Gabtoli, from Tongi through Uttara and from Mawa through Keraniganj.

Apart from the marchers coming from outside, opposition supporters in the capital will also gather in Paltan Maidan this afternoon. Senior leaders of the opposition alliance will address the gathering.

The government on Friday night issued a press note expressing apprehension of a law and order slide that would tarnish the country's image abroad and bring sufferings for people.

"Any kind of programme that creates sufferings and damages people's property is against the law," the press note issued by the home ministry said.

As before, the government has resorted to blanket arrest and manipulation of the transport owners and workers to foil the programme.

In 2004, before the April 30 opposition deadline to oust the government and after the August 21 agitation in the capital, the government used the same strategy of arresting grassroots opposition leaders and workers in masses to frustrate the opposition programmes.

Again in November last year, ahead of the 14-party's grand rally in Dhaka, the government masterminded a countrywide transport strike to make the gathering as thin as possible.