People of Bangladesh bid farewell to an eventful 2013, which left behind both pleasant and horrific memories.
Verdicts on crimes against humanity committed during the 1971 Liberation War and the execution of one of the war crimes convicts were the biggest events of the past year.
However, political violence aimed at preventing the war crimes trials and to press for a non-party, poll-time government had also cast shadows on the year.
A tragic ‘manmade’ disaster – the collapse of Rana Plaza at Savar – which killed over 1,100 people had shocked the people of Bangladesh who battle natural calamity almost every year.
An amazing mass gathering of general people at Dhaka’s Shahbagh at the beginning of 2013 had also been held, demanding the maximum punishment for war criminals.
Leaders and activists of the Opposition faced tough police actions in the second half of 2013 for their acts of violence.
Bangladesh has entered the New Year just five days before the 10th parliamentary election, scheduled for Jan 5, amid a sharp political polarisation between the ruling party and the Opposition.
The ruling Awami League and its allies are pressing ahead to hold the election on the date fixed by the Election Commission, the Opposition, led by the BNP is boycotting it.
bdnews24.com presents the major events of 2013 in Bangladesh for the readers.
Quader Molla Execution
The nation began to wash the ‘stains’ off through the trials and verdicts of the war criminals involved in murders, genocide, rapes and loots during 1971.
The first verdict was awarded in February, 2013, and the first execution of any war criminal took place in December.
Families of those killed during the war got justice after four decades through the hanging of Jamaat-e-Islami leader Abdul Quader Molla.
The Jamaat Assistant Secretary General, who had gained notoriety as the infamous ‘Mirpurer Kosai Quader’ or ‘Butcher of Mirpur’ for his atrocities, was hanged on the night of Dec 12.
The smiling photograph of Molla flashing a victory sign, following a life sentence given by the International Crimes Tribunal on Feb 5, had sparked off a huge public campaign for his death.
Thousands of youths revolted against the verdict terming it “too light”. Then tens of thousands congregated for weeks at the capital’s Shahbagh crossway’s now iconic Prajanma Chattar in a movement led by Ganajagaran Mancha.
The movement soon spread across the country and among Bangladeshi expatriates.
Dubbed as the ‘Bangla Spring’ by the Western media, the movement demanded an amendment to the law to give the State the scope to appeal for death penalty and the maximum punishment for all war criminals.
It is widely perceived that the Shahbagh demonstrations were part of the pressure that eventually made the government amend the International Crimes Act, under which the war crimes trials were being conducted, providing equal opportunities to defence and prosecution to appeal against a sentence.
The amendment allowed the prosecution to appeal against Molla’s sentence, seeking a more stringent penalty. Earlier, the prosecution could only appeal against an acquittal.
The Supreme Court, on Sept 17, revised Molla’s sentence to death penalty, following a prosecution appeal. On Dec 5, the full verdict was published and, three days later, the war crimes tribunal issued a death warrant.
As preparations were on to hang him on the night of Dec 10, in a dramatic turn of events the Supreme Court Chamber Judge postponed the execution at the eleventh hour.
But on Dec 12, the apex court decided that Molla’s the petition lacked merit and dismissed the defence application after hearing the arguments of the two sides.
Later that very night, the jail authorities carried out the execution.
Trials of the war criminals started immediately after the Independence of Bangladesh. Many were sentenced including corporal punishments. However, it stopped after the killing of Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman in Aug 15, 1975.
Justice ASM Sayem annulled the ‘Collaborators Act, 1972’ following a military order on Dec 31, 1975, rendering 73 tribunals across the country to try war criminals defunct.
The move caused more than a thousand war crimes trial to be dismissed and almost 11 thousand collaborators, Razaakar, members of Al Badr and Al Shams forces were acquitted.
Of them, 752 convicts, including 20 sentenced to death and 62 imprisoned for life, were set free.
Almost 15 years later, in the 90s, a mass movement, led by Jahanara Imam, held a mock trial of the then Jamaat-e-Islami chief Ghulam Azam, the notorious Guru of anti-liberationists.
After one and a half decade of that mock trial, the process of the long-due justice resumed with the forming of the International Crimes Tribunal on Mar 25, 2010.
The tribunal’s first verdict came on Jan 21, 2013. Former Jamaat member Abul Kalam Azad, alias Bachchu Razakar, was sentenced to death in absentia.
Jamaat leaders Delwar Hossain Sayedee, Mohammad Kamaruzzaman, Ali Ahsan Mohammad Mujaheed, two absconding Chhatra Sangha (Jamaat’s war-time student wing) leaders Ashrafuzzaman Khan and Chowdhury Mueen-Uddin were sentenced to death for their role against the nation’s struggle for freedom.
The party’s ideologue, Ghulam Azam, was given 90 years in prison, considering his delicate physical condition.
BNP leader and standing MP Salauddin Quader Chowdhury was sentenced to death, while former minister Abdul Alim was given life imprisonment on war crimes charges.
The convicts’ cases are currently pending at the Supreme Court’s Appellate Division. Of them, Sayedee’s case has progressed most.
In several of its verdicts, the two tribunals had identified the Jamaat as a ‘criminal’ organisation. The party has lost its registration with the Election Commission and has been barred from contesting the Jan 5 general elections. The tribunal’s investigation team is probing charges against the party.
Rana Plaza collapse
On Apr 24, Bangladesh witnessed its worst building collapse. The multi-storied Rana Plaza, at Savar, near Dhaka, crumbled, killing at least 1,131 people, mostly readymade garment workers, shocking the world community.
Many are still missing and body parts are still being recovered from the disaster site.
In all, 1,115 bodies were recovered till May 13, when the rescue efforts were officially called off. Of the 2,438 rescued, 16 died while undergoing treatment.
According to the army, which led the rescue work, 261 people were missing, but the district administration put the number at 176.
Of the victims, 234 could not be identified. They were buried at Dhaka’s Jurain graveyard. Many of the deceased were identified by DNA tests. Seven months after the incident, two skulls were found at the Rana Plaza collapse site.
The owner of the eight-storey building and garment factories housed in it had forced the workers to keep working a day after cracks appeared on the building walls.
Former Home Minister MK Alamgir had drawn flak for saying the collapse was triggered by the shaking of building by the Opposition activists.
Bangladesh’s main export-oriented sector came under scrutiny after the collapse. Buyers from various countries said they would shun Bangladeshi garment products.
The US in late June scrapped its generalised system of preference (GSP) facility for Bangladesh to “push it to improve” working conditions. GSP facility is a scheme by the developed countries to allow duty-free access of products from the poor and developing countries. Garment products did not enjoy GSP facility in the US.
Bangladesh’s biggest importer, the European Union (EU), too, threatened to reconsider its GSP facility.
Arrest of BNP leaders
Security forces raided the BNP’s central office twice in 2013. During the last raid, they entered the first floor by climbing a ladder and then breaking open the office.
The first raid was conducted on Mar 11, when BNP activists hurled stones at the law enforcers after the explosion of several crude bombs foiled a rally of the party in front of its office.
Party acting Secretary General Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir announced a day’s strike in protest against the bomb explosion.
Within an hour of his announcement, police arrested over one hundred party leaders and activists including Fakhrul, Altaf Hossain Chowdhury, Sadeque Hossain Khoka, Ruhul Kabir Rizvi and Zainul Abdin Farroque.
The next day, police released Fakhrul, Khoka and Altaf but sued other leaders, accusing them of being behind the bomb explosion and attacks on police.
The second raid was conducted at night.
Police broke open the office and detained Rizvi. They seized hard disks of two computes, some documents and cash and Rizvi’s laptop and mobile phone.
Later party’s another leader, Salahuddin Ahmed, started releasing video messages from a hideout.
Shahbagh movement
In February, Bangladesh witnessed an unprecedented uprising of youths.
Imbued with the spirit of 1971 war of independence and ignited by the life sentence of war crimes convict Abdul Quader Molla, youths numbering hundreds of thousands came out on the street and protested the verdict.
Many called it “Bangla springs” drawing a parallel of the uprising in Arab countries.
Soon after Molla verdict, some students gathered at the Shahbagh intersection responding to a facebook call of the Blogger and Online Activists Network.
They formed a human chain in front of the National Museum hours after the verdict and then held a rally from where they decided to stay put till ensuring the maximum punishment for Molla.
Their ceaseless movement at Shahbagh until Feb 21 ended with a six-point demand being placed before the government.
The Shahbagh movement was christened the “Ganajagaron Mancha”.
The International Crimes Tribunal was forced to amend its law and corporate a provision of appeal by the state.
Later, the apex court gave death penalty to Molla, who was hanged to death later in Dec.
The movement also spread outside the country.
The Mancha collected more than 10 million signatures from across Bangladesh in favour of the maximum punishment for all war criminals, and the banning of the Jamaat-e-Islami party, which had sided with Pakistan in the 1971 war that gave birth to Bangladesh.
Many of the Mancha activists were killed including the much-talked-about Rajib Haider, who was murdered on the 10th day of the movement.
Several bombs had also been exploded near Shahbagh.
Radical group Hifazat-e Islam also tried to occupy the Shahbagh intersection on Apr 6 but were resisted by Mancha supporters.
At the fag-end of the year, the Mancha again hit the headlines when they launched a movement against Pakistan soon after the country’s parliament adopted a resolution against Molla’s death penalty.
Hifazat-e Islam rally
Hifazat-e Islam came into the reckoning in 2013. Formed few years ago to protest policies of women’s empowerment, the Quami madrasa based group again rose when Shahbagh was chanting slogans against war criminals and Jamaat-e-Islami.
Ahmed Shafi, chairman of Quami Education Board, led the group.
They termed bloggers who organised the Shahbagh movement “atheist” and put forward their 13-point demand that include banning public mixing of men and women.
They claimed to be ‘apolitical’ but there had been allegations that Jamaat financed their activities. Even there had been allegations that Jamaat activists reinforced manpower support for Hifazat.
Besides some religious hardliners who are the members of the BNP-led 18-party alliance also found place in Hifazat’s committee.
In April, they organised a long-march pressing for their demands. Later, they gathered at Motijheel, where BNP leaders expressed their solidarity with them.
The ruling Awami League ally Jatiya Party leaders also joined them.
No women have been seen in the rally and even women scribes faced awkward situation.
A woman reporter of a television channel has been beaten up mercilessly.
On May 5, they again came back to Dhaka and staged a rally at the business hub, Motijheel.
But its activists resorted to massive arson attacks and vandalism to press for their 13-point demand.
Law enforcing agencies conducted a pincer operation during the night to evict them.
Their supporters claimed hundreds of them were killed at that night. But they could not produce any list of those who had been allegedly died.
Human rights group ‘Odhikar’ in its report claimed 61 people were killed in the late night drive, but it refused to give any information about the victims to the government.
Its secretary Adilur Rahman Khan, who was a Deputy Attorney General during the tenure of BNP-Jamaat-e-Islami, was arrested on Aug 10.
Detective Branch has submitted specific charges against Adilur and Odhikar’s director Nasiruddin Elan for fabricating facts about the eviction drive.
Police said the list included names of 26 deceased but they did not die in Motijheel’s Shapla Chattar on May 5.
Thirteen were killed in Dhaka before that operation was conducted by law enforcers, among then six died in attacks by activists of Hifazat-e Islam.
They remained active in their stronghold, the port city Chittagong.
They again tried to hold a rally on Dec 24 but they were not allowed to do so.
Hasina-Khaleda telephone talks
It has been a rare call amid the year-long violent political situation.
Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina phoned her arch-rival Opposition Leader Khaleda Zia on Oct 26 and invited her to her residence Ganabhaban to discuss the poll-time dispensation.
The two parties have been at loggerheads over the issue for long. But after Oct 24, the elections countdown began.
Hasina requested Khaleda to withdraw her shutdown and come to Ganabhaban for a dialogue. Khaleda, however, declined as she said she could not withdraw the shutdown as it had been already enforced.
In a 37-minute audio of the telephonic conversation that later went viral, exchanges of heated words between the two top leaders was heard.
Khaleda blamed the government for releasing the telephone conversation and interpreted it as government’s “lack of willingness” to continue talks.
As they did not talk again, the argument over who would spearhead the dialogue begun.
On Nov 23, news broke out that the Awami League General Secretary and BNP Acting Secretary General sat in a meeting at an undisclosed venue.
Senior leaders of both sides acknowledged the meeting but BNP acting secretary general denied it.
In the meantime, the Election Commission announced the election schedule, fixing Jan 5 as the polling date.
Submission of nominations expired on Dec 2. But the BNP did not join the elections.
The UN mediator Oscar Fernandez-Taranco came to Dhaka on Dec 6 to mediate talks.
He had hectic parleys with leaders of both the parties and different stakeholders, and was able to persuade senior leaders of the two parties to sit and talk twice.
But that could not solve the crisis. Before leaving Dhaka, he told a crowded press conference that the two parties must continue talks.
The two sides met again, as they had promised to Taranco.
There was no formal meeting after that, though the two parties did ever say that they would not continue the dialogue.
As the election process proceeded, more than half of the seats returned winners in the elections that BNP boycotted.
The Prime Minister later said that there was no scope for talks for the Jan 5 elections to elect the 10th Parliament.
She said, if the two parties could reach consensus and BNP stopped “killings”, the 10th Parliament would be dissolved and fresh elections would be announced.
During the entire month, the BNP-led alliance held shutdown and blockades that witnessed arson and bomb attacks in which scores of people, mostly innocent, were killed.
The government put senior BNP leaders in jail.
The European Union, Commonwealth and the US announced that they would not send monitors for the Jan 5 elections.
Lately, BNP proposed a ‘march for democracy’ to stop the elections in which the government prevented Khaleda Zia from coming out of her Gulshan residence.
The Opposition again called blockades from Wednesday, the first morning of the New Year.
Featured verdicts
In 2013, a special tribunal sentenced a record number of men to death for their role in the bloody 2009 mutiny at the Border Guard Bangladesh (BGB) Peelkhana headquarters. Verdict of Old Dhaka youth Biswajit Das’s murder case was also announced.
BNP Senior Vice Chairman Tarique Rahman’s acquittal in a case for allegedly siphoning off money was also talked about widely.
A total of 152 border guards, including its Deputy Assistant Director Touhidul Alam who had led the Feb 25-26 BDR mutiny in 2009, were sentenced to walk the gallows. One hundred and sixty-one others were sentenced to life in the verdict delivered on Nov 5.
Former BNP MP Nasiruddin Ahmed Pintoo and ruling Awami League’s local leader Torab Ali were given life sentences.
The mutiny that broke out just one month after a new government had taken charge shocked the world. A total of 57 army officers were killed. The number of convicted in a single case is unprecedented.
Old Dhaka tailor Biswajit was beaten and hacked to death on Dec 9, 2012 during the Opposition’s blockade. Pictures and video footage of the attack flooded the media.
The attackers were identified as members of the Awami League’s student front.
Although many were sceptical about the trial, since the accused belonged to the ruling party, a speedy trial tribunal delivered the verdict on Nov 18. Eight were sentenced to death while 13 others were given life sentences.
All the convicts were students of the Jagannath University and members of Bangladesh Chhatra League.
On Nov 17, a Dhaka court acquitted Opposition Leader Khaleda Zia’s elder son Tarique Rahman in a case of alleged siphoning off Tk 200 million.
However, Tarique’s friend Giasuddin Al-Mamun was sentenced to seven years in jail and fined Tk 400 million in the case.
Tarique has been staying in London over the past five years. The national anti-graft agency, the Anti Corruption Commission, has challenged the acquittal in court.
Khaleda’s younger son, Arafat Rahman Coco, is also staying abroad. He has been convicted in another case for siphoning off money.
Golfer Siddikur, cricketer Ashraful
Bangladesh’s flag flew in world golf tournament this year for the first time. Bangladeshi golfer Siddikur Rahman competed in the World Golf Championship held in Melbourne in Australia.
Bangladesh’s golf ace has been looking forward to attain his desired success in the Olympic Summer Games in 2016 in Brazil’s Rio de Janeiro, though he had failed to do so in the World Cup.
His target was to be among the top 20 out of the 60 contestants in the Gold World Cup but unaccustomed environment and inclement weather stood in the way. So, he had to be satisfied with his 55th position.
However, before going to Melbourne, Siddikur won the Hero Indian Open Champion title, the second one during his Asian tour, in New Delhi.
Bangladesh Cricket also attained success in 2013. Bangladesh’s team defeated New Zealand and West Indies at home and also got success in its Sri Lanka tour.
But the game was also hit by stigma as match fixing during Bangladesh Premier League was exposed.
Country’s one of the popular cricketers Mohammad Ashraful has been banned from all forms of the game for the match-fixing.
Siddikur earned a total of $ 0.486 million from the golf last year.
He earned prize money of $ 0.2 25 million by winning the Indian Open Champion title and stormed into the third position in Asian Tour’s order of merit.
Siddikur ended the year as top 10 golfers in the Asian Tour’s order of merit for the third time in last four years.
He now holds 166th position in World Golf Ranking. He will be able to be part of the next Olympic Games if he continues to retain his current position.
In picking golfers for the Olympic Games, the world ranking is followed.
In addition, there is a chance of Siddikur playing with the best golfers of Asia and Europe in the Eurasia Golf Cup to be held in Malaysia in March, 2014.
He has now been on the third position in the Asian Tour’s order of merit. First three golfers holding the position of the Asian Tour’s order of merit will get the scope to play in the Eurasia tournament.
Golf is becoming popular in Bangladesh day by day due to Siddikur’s success and many young golfers have emerged in the country’s golf circuit.
Ershad on the stage
Jatiya Party Chairman HM Ershad remained in the news throughout the year. He came into the limelight by criticising Ganajagaran Mancha, supporting Islamist group Hifazat-e Islam and writing letters to Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and Leader of the Opposition Khaleda Zia with a call for dialogues to end the political impasse.
He changed his party position on staying with the Awami League-led 14-party Alliance and later on joining the parliamentary polls.
He nominated candidates for 299 constituencies out of the total 300 and he himself sought to contest from three seats – Dhaka-17, Lalmonirhat-1 and Rangpur-3.
Five Jatiya Party leaders also joined the Hasina-led election-time interim government, but later on Dec 3 Ershad announced that his party would not join the polls ‘as all parties are not participating in the election and congenial environment does not exist’.
After the announcement, Ershad went into hiding for hours and later sat in a meeting with India’s Foreign Secretary Sujatha Singh. On Dec 5, he asked his party ministers to quit the government.
There was a rumour on Dec 6 that Ershad resigned as the Jatiya Party chief and his wife Raushan Ershad replaced him. That day Ershad announced that his party could join the polls if the schedule was deferred by 10 days.
Heavily guarded by law enforcers, he was later admitted to the Combined Military Hospital.
Kazi Zafar Ahmed, who was expelled from Jatiya Party following differences with Ershad over joining election, formed Jatiya Party (Zafar).
Oishee issue: gruesome murders
Police’s special branch officer Mahfuzur Rahman and his wife Swapna Begum were found murdered at their Chamelibagh residence in Dhaka on Aug 16.
The couple’s daughter Oishi Rahman was arrested over the murder and police said she admitted to having committed the crime.
However, Oishi, a student of Oxford International School, later disowned the confession and denied her involvement in the murder. But DNA test proved her link to the killing.
There were controversies over her age as well. According to her certificate, she was not an adult but medical tests said she was almost 19 years.
Oishi’s friend Asaduzzaman Johnny and domestic help Khadija Khatun Sumi were also arrested in connection with the murder.
As the year neared its end, six people, including a so-called Pir (saint) were killed in Gopibagh in the capital on Dec 21.
The victims are – Lutfur Rahman (the ‘Pir’), his son Monir Hossain, his deciples ‘Shaheen’, ‘Rasel’, and Mujibur Rahman. Monir worked at the City Bank’s Sadarghat branch, according to his family.
Family and police said religious fanatics in guise of disciples of the ‘Pir’ had killed them.
Police are yet to make any arrests.
Source: bdnews24