After 17 years in self-imposed exile, Tarique Rahman has returned to Bangladesh on Christmas
Outlook had reported earlier that Rahman is set to return to Dhaka.
The BNP is hoping for elections to be held as scheduled.
The eldest son of Bangladesh's former President Ziaur Rahman and former Prime Minister Khaleda Zia, Tarique Rahman, returned to the country after almost 17 years of self-imposed exile. Thousands of Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) supporters welcomed Rahman and his family at Dhaka airport. The BNP supporters were carrying placards and banners.
Outlook had earlier reported that Rahman is set to return home on Christmas morning, a homecoming that has electrified party cadres but also revived long-standing anxieties over political violence that has wracked the country in recent months.
BNP supporters and party activists, were carrying placards and banners, and marched on foot toward the Dhaka airport along Banani Airport Road to commemorate the return of Rahman to Bangladesh.
Images of Zia at London's Heathrow airport, pictured while leaving for Dhaka with his wife, Zubaida Rahman, and daughter, Zaima Rahman, went viral on social media. "On the way back to my motherland, Bangladesh!" Zaima Rahman wrote on her Facebook page, sharing pictures from inside the aircraft, with her father and mother smiling beside her.
His party said it was preparing for an "unprecedented" gathering of more than five million people in the capital to welcome them.
Rahman has lived in London since 2008. He faced multiple criminal convictions in Bangladesh, including for money laundering and in a case related to a plot to assassinate Hasina. He has since been acquitted of all charges after Hasina's removal, clearing the legal barriers that had delayed his return.
