Top headline in a newspaper on October 9 read: “Terrorism bell rings”. Sceptics remarked: After Tribunal politics over 1971 war crimes, Bill-board politics over development spectacles, lynching crowd and death sentence politics to stamp and possibly ban Jamaat-e-Islami and BNP as “enemies” of the nation, the beleaguered ruling party unable to contain political turmoil, labour unrest, public discontent and mafia boils of criminality is now focused on terrorism scare politics to portray Hefazat-e Islam as terrorist outfit.
The story under the said headline quoted high police officials as saying anonymously: “The recent arrest of some militants and Hefajat-e Islam men, and Monday’s explosion at a Chittagong madrasa are not isolated incidents. There is no doubt that they will try to create anarchy, several attempts for terrorist attacks but couldn’t succeed due to constant watch and crackdown on militants by law-enforcement agencies. It does not mean that they will not be successful if there is more political unrest.”
An accompanying story read: “Two prime suspects in the Monday (7 October) morning blast at a Chittagong madrasa have easily escaped arrest, thanks to an apparent late response from law enforcers. Mufti Izharul Islam Chowdhury, the founder and principal of Jamiatul Ulum Al Islamia Madrasa, and his son Harun Izhar got enough time till police moved to arrest them late in the evening that day.
“The explosion occurred in a second-floor room of the madrasa’s four-storey dormitory around 11:30am. Both Izharul and Harun were on the madrasa premises till late afternoon amid a huge police presence and talked to the media. Yesterday (Tuesday 8 October) morning, police filed two cases, one under the explosives act and the other for preserving acid in the madrasa against some 12 people. Hefajat-e Islam Nayeb-e-Ameer Mufti Izharul, and Harun Izhar, Hefajat’s publicity secretary, were named as the prime accused. Police also recovered a handmade grenade at the madrasa compound in Lalkhan Bazar area early yesterday.”
Police concoction alleged
Over twenty revered Islamic scholars and leaders of Hefazat-e Islam in a joint statement rubbished the above story as a case concocted by the police. They claimed that the explosion in the Lalkhan Bazar Madrassa of Chittagong was in fact a burst of fire from a faulty electric IPS connection entangled with a gas stove, an accident.
They further claimed that the explosion was indeed regarded as an accident, caused by negligent electric wiring, by the local people and passing witnesses, the students and teachers present including Mufti Azharul Islam, the Fire Service men, the journalists present, and by the police and the detectives arriving at the place of occurrence up to the time of Maghrib prayers in the evening. But within half an hour of the occurrence, a group of mastans (extortionist musclemen) led by “killer” Didarul Alam Masud, a Jubo League leader of the ruling party brought out a procession with banners denouncing the Madrassa and demanding its closure. And mysteriously after 6 p.m., words began to be spread from law-enforcement agencies that a hand-made grenade, an acid filled container, and some ammunition had been discovered in the madrassa premises.
The Olamae Keram and Hefazat leaders raised questions: Why was a search carried out in the dark of the night (implying the incriminating materials were planted)? Why did the administration order closure of the madrassa? Why were the teachers and students of the madrassa forced to leave the premises and some innocent teachers and students implicated in fabricated criminal proceedings? Was it part of a surreptitious action programme of the government to progressively reduce madrassa establishments and madrassa students, as expressly desired by the Prime Minister’s son, Sajeeb Wajed Joy?
Propaganda compounding crisis?
Whether or not the doubts raised by the Islamic scholars and Hefazat leaders are well-founded, the government is patently suffering from a syndrome of lack of credibility and excess of propaganda compounding the ongoing political crisis. Excess of propaganda strategy has gone sour over the proceedings of the International Crimes Tribunal of Bangladesh trying “enemy collaborators” during the liberation war of 1971.
Commenting on the death sentence of “Salahuddin Quader Chowdhury, an opposition law maker” of the present parliament in Bangladesh on October 1, New York Times of the same date noted in a clinical news-commentary:
“It was the seventh conviction handed down by the tribunal. Virtually every major turn in the legal process has sparked riots, either by Islamist or secularist protesters, and the authorities on Tuesday had increased security in the Bangladeshi capital, Dhaka, and in Chittangong, Mr. Chowdhury’s native region. Mr. Chowdhury, 64, is aligned with the Bangladeshi Nationalist Party, which is expected to make gains in parliamentary elections in January. He was charged with killing 200 civilians and assisting the Pakistan Army in torture and mass murder during the nine-month conflict.
“Mr. Chowdhury, then a student at Dhaka University, was not aligned with any political party during the war, but his father used the family residence, Goods Hill, as a prison and interrogation center at that time. As the judges were leaving the bench, Mr. Chowdhury stood in the courtroom and dismissed the verdict as politically driven, saying a leaked copy had been available on the Internet for days. ‘It came from the ministry,’ he said. ‘Thanks to the Law Ministry.’ Mr. Chowdhury’s wife told reporters that the family would appeal the decision. ‘We will do whatever we need to do to show that this is a farce.’
HRW criticizes ICT rule
“Human Rights Watch has criticized the tribunal, saying it is marred by ‘a strong judicial bias toward the prosecution.’ Opposition forces have dismissed the tribunal as politically motivated. Jamaat-e-Islami, an Islamist opposition party allied with the Bangladeshi Nationalist Party, has been barred by a Supreme Court ruling from participating in the January elections.”
The row that was kicked up by the leakage of the judgment ahead of its pronouncement in court, the terrorist scare real or imagined, growing signs of public disenchantment with the present government and possible debacle for the ruling party electorally or otherwise in the transition of power due within months, and sharp rebuke by the judicial establishment of the country led by the Vice-Chairman of the Bar Council delivered to “those associated” with the mistrial and evident perversion of the course of justice appears to have had a moderating effect on the Tribunal.
In its latest judgment against another senior opposition leader, former parliamentarian and minister Abdul Alim, for war crimes found proven by the Tribunal on October 9, the judges coined a new phrase “imprisonment till death” to replace life-sentence in their verdict. Presumably this was to appease the lynching crowd let loose by the ruling party, against all accused implicated in war crimes, with the smell of death in captivity of the convicted old man, but stopping short of actual death sentences for which the Tribunal has been much criticised at home and abroad. But the stigma that has been attached to the Tribunal for “faulty” proceedings and “biased” judgment will hardly be erased by such semantics.
Source: Weeklyholiday
