Leaders of the combined platform became infuriated at the move to foil the meeting and vowed to announce tougher programmes in the meeting of the steering committee to be held tomorrow in Dhaka.

The cancelled meeting, supposed to be held at 4:30pm at Bashundhara field at Baipail in Ashulia, was aimed at informing the workers about the agreement signed between the platform and the government and mobilising workers to implement the decisions in a peaceful way, sources said.

Since noon, huge contingents of police, riot police and armed police have taken position at every thoroughfare leading to the meeting venue and prevented both the general people and workers from entering the area. Even the journalists were barred at several points.

Meanwhile, leaders of the platform claimed that the death news of Liton, a worker of Scandex Garments Ltd (SGL), is not true and he is still alive.

The identity card of Liton, recovered by police on Thursday with a body of an unknown person, was taken away by the gang that allegedly kidnapped Liton several days back identifying themselves as members of Rapid Action Battalion (Rab), leaders alleged.

They further alleged that police did not accept the abduction case in full details filed by Liton, organising secretary of Savar unit of Swadhin Bangla Garments Sramik Karmochari Federation (SBGSKF), and also omitted the incident of snatching of identity card.

"We will hand over Liton to BGMEA today (Friday) to ensure his security as he feels insecure." said Shamima Nasrin, president of SBGSKF, adding, "The death news is a conspiracy".