On 21st August 2004, state-sponsored terrorists carried out a gruesome grenade attack on a rally in front of the Awami League's central office on Bangabandhu Avenue in the capital. Sheikh Hasina and top leaders of the Awami League narrowly escaped, but the splinters killed Ivy Rahman and 24 activists. The attack injured more than four hundred people. Many of them are permanently crippled while some lost their normal life. The party leaders saved Sheikh Hasina's life from the attack by creating a human shield. Her hearing was damaged even though she survived. Later, the BNP-Jamaat government tried to cover up the matter with a confessional statement about the grenade attack by a person named Judge Miah. However, the attack was re-investigated during the 2007 military-backed caretaker government. The names of Mufti Abdul Hannan, the leader of the banned organization Harkatul Jihad, and Abdus Salam Pintu, deputy minister of the then BNP government, came up there. The names of several BNP leaders and government officials including one of the top leaders of BNP Tarique Rahman, and the then State Minister for Home Affairs Lutfuzzaman Babar leaked through the confession of the criminals. Explosive experts said the Arges grenades, which were used in the attack, came from Pakistan.
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