Fundamentalists’ hullaballoo & Khaleda; Shahbagh against war criminals

File photo shows Khaleda speaking intimate to Sayedee and Jamaat chief Nizami

Friday is always an important day in Bangladesh mainly because it’s the first holiday of the week! The professionals and students who pass a hectic week go for relief and complete the unfinished tasks while some take a brief tour to a distant location. Most businessmen choose the day for a rest while some makes more money cashing in this lack of sellers.

And another significance of the day is its being the Juma prayer-day when Muslims gather for prayers and seek the Almighty’s grace; praying with a mass gathering for the Muslim’s well-being is better (there’s a term in Islam). However, the main purpose of praying to God is bowing before him, making the contact with the God closer and achieve humane values for the betterment of self and the mankind. Prayers make Muslims, who follows the eternal issues, gentle and wise.

But the last couple of Fridays have not been peaceful or nor tolerably chaotic as some quarters in the country are dealing with one serious issue — the war crimes trials and the verdicts given against Jamaat-e-Islami leaders. Three verdicts have been handed down so far, of which two are against top Jamaat leaders while another against an expelled Jamaat member. The radical Islamist party, which was banned following the war that ended on December 16, 1971, didn’t protest the DEATH SENTENCE given against its former member, but had declared a hartal for the day (February 5) Jamaat leader Quader Mollah was sentenced for life. They launched atrocities the night before and have ever been continuing. However, upon their threats or for some other undisclosed reasons, Mollah escaped DEATH PENALTY even though it was proved that the Jamaat assistant secretary general was involved in genocide and rape. Well, the Jamaatis didn’t like this verdict too even though Mollah while coming out showed V-sign!

Well, centring the verdict, the pro-liberation people burst into anger, first on the social media, especially Facebook and blogs, and at around 3pm formed a human chain in front of National Museum to protest the verdict and demanding DEATH PENALTY for all war criminals including Mollah. The protest has since then spread across the globe.

But this unique protest has raised the eyebrows of the BNP too as it aims at Jamaat and the BNP is the patron of Jamaat since its resumption of politics in Ziaur Rahman’s era. Some top leaders of the BNP criticised the movement saying it was govt-sponsored and …

Few days later, the BNP chief in a statement lauded the UPRISING, but advised them to raise the other top issues too. As the protesters didn’t do so, the top BNP leaders continued their abusive words against SHAHBAGH.

During the protest, Jamaat-Shibir supporters have been active on the Facebook spreading different propaganda against the participants in protest while pro-Jamaat newspapers Amar Desh, Naya Diganta, Sangram, Inqilab and TV channel Diganta doing the same in the name of JOURNALISM.

The massive blow on Shahbagh came as blogger Razib, a friend of Shahbagh, was murdered in front of his house in Mirpur’s Pallabi on February 15. The next day was a day of spreading propaganda by Shibir activists in Facebook against Razib to justify the killing! He was an atheist, true, but they blamed him, who used to write with the nick Thaba Baba, for running a WORDPRESS site under the banner of “Nurani Chapa Somogro” where 19 blogs were posted from June 2012 to November 2012. Within a day, it was revealed that even though Razib had negative views about Islam and Prophet Muhammad and he could have some write-ups in his blogs (Thaba Baba used to write regularly on somewhereinblog.com and amarblog.com), the WORDPRESS site was published just after the killing–a story that reminds me of Ramu violence which was instigated by an Islamist Muktadir showing people that a Buddhist had posted a photo derogatory to Islam!

amar desh acting editor mahmudur rahman (left)

On February 17 daily Inqilab and the next day Amar Desh published the blogposts, only to provoke the Islamist parties in opposition alliance join Jamaat-Shibir-BNP and the retard or dumb-head Muslims against SHAHBAGH. They were successful indeed as the fanatics in the name of saving Islam brought out violent protests everywhere in the country and demeaned mosques, Shaheed Minars and the national flag. They attacked journalists and police, as usual.

Yet, the editors of the two newspapers haven’t been arrested nor the newspapers banned!

Last Thursday, the tribunal delivered verdict in Sayedee case, and Jamaat-Shibir enforced another hartal that day and before the verdict was handed down, the fanatics swooped on police and people’s property. Throughout the day, around 34 people including policemen and people were killed.

The next day was nothing better, the clashes continued and some 10 people were killed.

In these attacks, a new trend began, the Hindus in several district were attacked, their houses looted and set on fire, killing at least one old man in Banshkhali of Chittagong. Rather, Jamaat-Shibir declared a 48-hour shutdown for Sunday and Monday.

After her return from Singapore, BNP chief Khaleda Zia, who takes suggestion of her son Tarique Rahman and has 47 other advisors, Friday afternoon expressed her solidarity for the attackers, blamed Shahbagh and the govt for standing against Islam and declared hartal for Tuesday, only to trigger the ongoing violence. Shahbagh has slammed Khaleda for her literally clear pro-Jamaat stance.

Therefore, violence resumed Saturday morning in different parts of the country.

Sometime in the last couple of days, the Aljazeera stopped running the #Ajstream feed with #shahbagh #shahbag, a campaign that helped make links among many Bangladeshis telling the international media about the fanatics and their role in 1971.

Meanwhile, police arrested five students of North South University in connection with the murder of blogger Razib.

The Shahbagh protesters have vowed to resist the evil forces and continuing their campaigns. The day has two events: hoisting national flags at 11am and protest rallies at all educational institutions from 11am-12noon.

Long Live Shahbagh, Long Live Bangladesh!