Dhaka:  Fearing arrest of a Bangladeshi opposition leader who returned home after going into self-exile, hundreds of his supporters took to the streets overnight in the suburban Narayanganj area here.

The followers of Shamim Osman encircled his residence with bamboo sticks afer the Awami League leader returned home yesterday to contest in next month's polls as a candidate of the AL-led mega alliance.

Police, however, denied making any attempt to arrest Osman with the police chief of the area saying that the supporters were moblised under a 'planned campaign' as he filed nomination papers on the last day of the election commission deadline.

A former AL legislator, Osman fled the country fearing 'political persecution' soon after the 2001 general elections that brought Khaleda Zia's Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) to power.

Osman, an accused in several criminal cases, faced flak from the media for patronising rowdy elements to retain political influence over rivals, an allegation he vehemently denied, saying 'fundamentalist forces' that opposed Bangladesh's 1971 independence, tried to establish his 'Godfather' image.

His aides claimed police could not arrest him as the cases against him were stalled by the High Court pending hearing as he spend the past five years in India and the United States.