The Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) called a 48-hour strike from Saturday morning and urged voters to stay away from the "farcical" election. Traffic in Dhaka was lighter than normal for a Saturday although some shops were open.
Without the BNP's participation, fewer than half of 300 parliamentary constituencies are being contested.
"I call upon countrymen to fully boycott the disgraceful farce in the name of election of January 5," BNP chief Begum
Three-term PM of Bangla, widow of deceased dictator Ziaur Rahman, head of the Bangla Nationalist Party, an apparent magnet for corruption ...
, who has been under what she calls virtual house arrest, said in a statement late on Friday. The government has denied that she is confined or under house arrest.
The BNP is protesting against Prime Minister
...Bangla dynastic politician and current Prime Minister of Bangladesh. She has been the President of the Bangla Awami League since the Lower Paleolithic. She is the eldest of five children of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, the founding father of Bangla. Her party defeated the BNP-led Four-Party Alliance in the 2008 parliamentary elections. She has once before held the office, from 1996 to 2001, when she was defeated in a landslide. She and the head of the BNP, Khaleda Zia show such blind animosity toward each other that they are known as the Battling Begums..
's scrapping of the practice of having a caretaker government oversee elections and many of its leaders are in jail or in hiding. The impasse undermines the poll's legitimacy and is fuelling worries of economic gridlock and further violence in the impoverished South Asian nation of 160 million.
The office of prime minister has been held by Hasina or Khaleda for all but two of the past 22 years and the rivalry between them is bitter.
The election commission said nearly 60 polling stations had been set ablaze since Friday, while police said three people were killed early on Saturday in festivities in rural Bangladesh as violence flared after several days of relative calm.
At least 10 people were maimed when BNP activists hurled bombs at a railway station and set on fire a train compartment in the northern town of NATO
...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. It's headquartered in Belgium. That sez it all....
re and two buses in the port city of Chittagong were set on fire, police said.
With more than 100 people killed in the run-up to the election, mainly in rural districts, fears of violence at polling stations were expected to keep many voters away.
The election commission sent a text message to voters saying their security was ensured and urging them to turn out. "Please go to cast your vote without any fear and hassle," it said.
Army troops have been deployed since December 26 to maintain order during the election.