BNP  Chairperson and former Prime Minister Khaleda Zia, now in jail, turns '74' today, reports UNB. BNP will arrange two doa mahfil--one at its Nayapaltan office at 11am and another at BNP chairperson's Gulshan office in the evening--today marking the birthday. Besides, the party will arrange doa mahfil in all upazilas and districts across the country on August 15 the same day to pray for her recovery from illness and release from jail.

As in the last two years, the party has no programme to cut any cake to celebrate the birthday in the early hours of today. Amid criticisms by Awami League leaders for celebrating her birthday on the National Mourning Day, BNP marked her 72nd and 73rd birthday through holding doa mahfil instead of cutting any cake.

She, however, cut cakes at night the following day and party leaders and activists also celebrated it on their own in the last two years.

Khaleda has been in Old Dhaka Central Jail since her conviction in Zia Orphanage Trust graft case by a lower court on February 8 last.

Meanwhile, the nation is set to observe the National Mourning Day the same day commemorating the assassination of Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and most of his family members on August 15, 1975.

She and her party have been observing August 15 as her birthday since 1991, but there are controversies about her actual date of birth and even the birth year.

Various records suggest Khaleda Zia was born in 1945 and she will turn 74 yesterday. But her party claimed in 2015 that her actual birth year is 1946. She also registered her birth year 1946 in her new passport.

According to Banglapedia and well-known encyclopedias Wikipedia and Britannica Khaleda was born to Iskandar Majumder, a businessman, and Taiyaba Majumder in Dinajpur district in 1945.

The biodata of Khaleda Zia submitted to the Parliament Secretariat when she was made the opposition leader last suggests that she was born on August 15, 1945.

The controversy over the birthday began in 1991 when Khaleda first celebrated it on August 15 after assuming office as prime minister and declared it as her 'official birthday'.

Awami League leaders have long been claiming that her birthday is September 5, 1945 as per her marriage certificate while August 19, 1946 as per her first passport. Khaleda herself put the date as August 9, 1944 while registering for her matriculation exams, they said.