Bangladesh: Reign of Terror

POLITICS STEADILY WORSENS in Bangladesh. The economy is in free fall, law and order is in a cul-de-sac. The rule of law is under organised assault, with detained politicians, cultural activists and journalists unable to come by bail in court. The decks are stacked against functionaries and supporters of the Awami League government which had collapsed in the face of largescale public disorder in August.

Add to this a worsening of relations between Bangladesh and India, specifically around the persecution of the Hindu minority. It is hard to imagine that two nations which historically, and especially since Bangla­desh’s war for freedom in 1971, have been allies are today witness to an unimaginable low in their relations. Indian visas remain on hold for Bangladeshis, and that comes with news from Kolkata of a hospital refusing to provide medical treatment to Bangladeshis already in West Bengal.

Emotions are high in both countries. Tempers have flared over the arrest of Chinmoy Krishna Das Prabhu, a prominent spokesperson of the Hindu community formerly associated with the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON). The priest has been denied bail, and a section of people has voiced its anger over the killing of a Muslim lawyer while Das was being taken to court. Now reports have emerged about Das’ lawyer being subjected to violence by a mob, to a point where he is undergoing treatment in hospital. On Tuesday, December 3, when the priest was brought to a court in Chittagong, proceedings could not be initiated because no lawyer was present to defend him. Intimidation had done its work. Lawyers had been warned, in this expanding mob culture, not to defend him. Thus, the priest remains in prison.

The attitude falls into a pattern. In the more than three months that have elapsed since the Sheikh Hasina government was shown the door, the system of justice has been taking a mauling. Ministers and other functionaries of the Awami League govern­ment, once they were brought to court from prison, were physically assaulted by anti-Awami League lawyers. They were pelted with eggs and shoes. Such humiliation was rained down on a judge in court a few days ago because he was seen to not have demon­strated proper respect to late General Ziaur Rahman in his statement. Eggs were hurled at the judge by pro-Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) lawyers. He was compelled to leave the court.

Large groups of Hindus have organised demonstrations in cities like Chittagong, vowing to remain in Bangladesh despite the systematic attacks on them. On the other hand, a spat between the Bangladesh and Indian governments has left Bangladesh’s citizens, those who have consistently upheld friendly ties between the two countries, extremely perturbed

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While large groups of Hindus have organised demonstrations in such Bangladeshi cities as Chittagong, vowing to remain in Bangladesh despite the systematic attacks they have been subjected to, a spat between the Bangladesh and Indian governments has left Bangladesh’s citizens, those who have consistently upheld friendly ties between the two countries, extremely perturbed.

That raises the uncomfortable question: Where is the Muhammad Yunus regime in all this? The answer could not be clearer: It is at sea. Where its fundamental responsibility after August 5 should have been prosecution of the corrupt elements benefiting from 15 years of uninterrupted Awami League rule and where it ought to have gone for a clean-up of the political system towards preparing Bangladesh for free, fair and democratic elections, Yunus and his advisers have been presiding over a country sliding increasingly towards chaos. It is anarchy which has characterised Bangladesh for over three months since Hasina’s departure from Dhaka.

The Yunus regime, which has no constitutional basis, has nevertheless embarked on what it touts as a reform agenda. As many as 11 commissions have been instituted on the various reforms it thinks should be in place before elections can be contemplated. Its supporters have spoken of a four-year term in office for the regime. Weeks ago, the army chief spoke of elections being organised within 18 months. The haze has not cleared. The issue has worried BNP which, having been out of power since 2006, is anxious not to miss this opportunity to form the next government. As for the Jamaat-e-Islami, earlier BNP’s junior partner in a coalition and historically reviled by Bangladeshis for its murderous collaboration with the Pakistan occupation army in 1971, it has quietly been placing its adher­ents in significant positions in the government structure.

The Jamaat, taking advantage of the anarchy let loose, is in the ascendant. It is on a mission to cleanse Bangladesh of everything related to the War of Liberation. On a recent visit to London, the chief of the party, responding to questions about its role in 1971—when it had collaborated with the Pakistan military in the murder of Bengalis through its goon squads Al-Badr, Al-Shams and the Razakars—he made it known that if there was incontrovertible evidence of Jamaat’s guilt, the party would be prepared to offer an apology to Bangladesh’s people. That statement flies in the face of reality, given that in the Awami League era a good number of its leading figures were tried on charges of collaboration with Pakistan, convicted of war crimes and crimes against humanity, and marched to the gallows.

Yunus’ interim government has demonstrated, unabashed­ly, its intent to erase Bangladesh’s history. Its proponents have now moved the higher judiciary, to argue that the national slogan of Joi Bangla be removed from the constitution. A few weeks ago, one of the young men instrumental in installing Yunus in power, had the portrait of the Father of the Nation, Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, pulled down at Bangabhaban, the presidential residence. This man, along with two others, had only minutes earlier taken his oath of office by swearing fealty to the constitution, which records the primacy of Mujibur Rahman in Bangladesh’s history.

Muhammad Yunus, on a visit to the us in September, made it known in the presence of Bill Clinton that the agitation against the Hasina government had been meticulously planned. Nothing could be a clearer pointer to the intrigue which had gone into the creation of the crisis

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BANGLADESH IS THUS in a process of regression. Lead­ers, activists and supporters of the Awami League live in a state of fear under the fascism which has been running riot on Yunus’ watch. While the regime has remained in touch with BNP, Jamaat and other parties, it has gone out on a limb to avoid any mention of or link with the Awami League. In the long run, this attitude will boomerang owing to political reali­ties. An inescapable reality is that no fewer than 40 per cent of voters are loyal to the Awami League and have regularly voted for the party at successive elections. Yunus and his team will ignore such a huge chunk of the population at risk to their own reputations and future.

Across the country, inflation has been eating into people’s economic ability to cope with their daily needs. The middle and poor classes are in a bind, with growing numbers of citizens voicing the sentiment aagei bhalo chhilo (things were better earlier). In the garments and transport sectors, discontent grows by the day. Chaos reigns at educational institutions, with teachers worried about their safety in the aftermath of the vio­lence forcing hundreds of their colleagues at schools, colleges and universities to resign. With the government sticking to the refrain of what it calls martyrs killed in the anti-Hasina move­ment, questions relating to the hundreds killed by vigilantes post-August 5 have never been answered by the regime. Police­men, whose colleagues have been killed in the anti-Awami mayhem, have been reluctant to return to their duties.

A growing sense of tragedy has engulfed Bangladesh. The media cowers in the face of mob violence. The spectacle of mobs accusing prominent daily newspapers like the Daily Star and Prothom Alo of being pro-Awami League and pro-India was a broad hint of the fear that courses through the country’s media landscape. Editors are unwilling, given the atmosphere of fear, to publish comments and news reports critical of the regime.

Bangladesh has been slipping into darkness, in terms of politics and history, since August 5. Structures symbolising the War of Liberation have been destroyed; Bangabandhu’s home, a museum in his memory since 1994, was torched on the day the Awami League government fell. The prime minister’s official residence Ganabhaban was ransacked on the same day.

No one in the interim administration, formed on August 8, has ever con­demned such vandalism. Instead, the Yunus regime went into an anti-history mode: it decreed an end to the observance of March 7, the anniversary of Bang­abandhu’s seminal speech, and August 15, the anniver­sary of his assassination, as public holidays.

Asked on Voice of Amer­ica Bangla why the home of Mujibur Rahman had been set on fire, Yunus evaded the question but indignantly went on to glorify the condi­tions which had placed him in power. A reset button, he told the anchor, had come in and history had begun anew. In other words, in his view, the past did not matter. The statement predictably caused much condemnation in Bangladesh and beyond.

The refrain of the August 5 change, for those who hold power at present, continues to be one of a student-led revolution. It was anything but. Muhammad Yunus, on a visit to the US in September, publicly made it known in the presence of his friend Bill Clinton that the agitation against the Sheikh Hasina government had been me­ticulously planned. Nothing could be a clearer pointer to the intrigue which had gone into the creation of the crisis between mid-July and early August. It was a reminder of the intrigues the likes of Henry Kissinger had been involved in, with their friends in Dhaka, against Mujibur Rahman’s government in 1975.

On December 3, when Chinmoy Krishna Das was brought to court, proceedings could not be initiated because no lawyer was present to defend him. Intimidation had done its work. Lawyers had been warned, in this expanding mob culture, not to defend him

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The decline continues unabated. A commission has been formed to go into constitutional reforms. Headed by a Bangla­deshi-American academic who was once a journalist working for BBC Bangla, the commission has been subjected to grilling in the court of public opinion. Kamal Hossain and Amir-ul- Islam, two of Bangladesh’s eminent lawyers and politicians involved with the formulation of the constitution in 1972, have not had their opinions solicited on the reforms.

The fear is that the existing constitution, adopted by the Constituent Assembly in 1972, will be jettisoned in favour of a new one suiting the temperament of those who comman­deered power in August—a document ensuring the primacy of Islam through the removal of secular democracy. Another commission has been entrusted with the task of reforming the media, which is rather curious. How does one reform the media, other than doing away with the restrictions that have been in place to silence journalists?

Bangladesh’s crisis is existential. All the values instrumen­tal to its emergence 50-plus years ago are systematically being jettisoned by a regime that lacks constitutional legitimacy. Again, none of the individuals now in power has had any experience of running a government or ministry. A good number among them has for years administered NGOs. Besides, the inclusion of students in the council of advisers has raised questions about their necessity or performance in the prevailing conditions.

And there is another reality that cannot be ignored. In terms of the constitution, Sheikh Hasina remains prime minister. When the military had her leave the country in August, she was not given the opportunity to meet the president and submit her resignation. Her followers have thus continued to refer to her as the legitimate leader. Attempts have been made, meanwhile, to remove President Mohammed Shahabuddin, ignoring the fact that with parliament decreed out of existence and the speaker having resigned, he cannot hand over power to a successor as specified in the constitution.

As the darkness lengthens across the land, uncertainty piles up. It spreads with every passing moment. Today’s Bangladesh is light years removed from the Bangladesh as of the morning of August 5, 2024.

About The Author

Syed Badrul Ahsan

Syed Badrul Ahsan is a Bangladeshi journalist and political analyst. He is the author of biographies of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, Bangladesh’s founder, and Tajuddin Ahmad, the country’s wartime prime minister