Sheikh Fazle Shams Parash and Mainul Hosain Khan Nikhil respectively have been made the new chairman and general secretary of Bangladesh Awami Jubo League, the youth wing of ruling Bangladesh Awami League, for the next three years.
Parash, the eldest son of Jubo League’s founder Chairman Sheikh Fazlul Huq Moni, was elected as the Jubo League chairman unopposed during the 7th national congress held at the capital’s Suhrawardi Udyan on Saturday.
Awami League general secretary Obaidul Quader, also the Minister for Road Transport and Bridges Affairs, announced the names of the new leaderships.
Earlier, Chayan Islam, convener of the Jubo League congress preparatory committee, proposed the names while its incumbent secretary Harun-Or-Rashid supported it amid huge clapping from the participants.
A total of seven aspirants were contesting for the general secretary post of the Jubo League. Of them, Nikhil, incumbent president of Dhaka City north unit of the youth wing, was picked as general secretary.
Earlier in the morning, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, also the president of Awami League, inaugurated the council.
According to party sources, being elected as the Jubo League chairman, Parash, the eldest son of Bangabandhu's nephew Mani, is making his first foray into politics with the task of repairing the image of Jubo League, which has been marred by controversies in recent times.
He had been pursuing a career in academia having completing his graduate degree in English from Dhaka University. His younger brother Sheikh Fazle Noor Taposh is an elected lawmaker while their uncle Sheikh Fazlul Karim Selim, who is a former chairman of the Jubo League, is a presidium member of the Awami League.
He succeeds another relative Omar Faruk Chowdhury, the husband of Sheikh Fazlul Karim Selim’s sister, as chairman of the organisation.
Faruk was ousted from his post amid the government's crackdown on illegal casino business in which a number of influential Jubo League leaders were implicated.
The Jubo League held its seventh congress amid a drastic change in its leadership and keeping a large number of top ranking leaders sidelined due to their involvement in various types of irregularities and crimes like casino businesses, tender manipulation and corruptions.
