Polarisation of National Polity

Every year since these horrifying events, we as a nation mourn our martyrs (as we should) but forty two years later not one of the perpetrators of this crime have been identified or brought to justice. How does this reflect on our collective conscience? The ideals and aspirations that energized our War of Liberation (freedom, democracy, economic emancipation) remains as elusive today as it was four decades ago. Why so and who is responsible one may ask. The answer to this can be discerned by the events in our nation politics in the recent past as well as external factors that weighed in on decisions taken by our political leaders.

Release of 195 Pak POWs

It would not be unreasonable to recall these, especially decisions taken to acquiesce to the release and return of the 195 Pakistani POWs who had been identified for genocide, war crimes, rape and crimes against humanity during the Bangladesh War of Liberation. At the behest of the Indian government Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahaman agreed to the release and return of these Pakistani POWs, who were in the custody of India, so that today after forty years they remain untried in any court of law. Domestically in Bangladesh, the then govt. justifiably focused on the more urgent needs of national reconstruction and rehabilitation of a war ravaged country and the return of the ten million refugees from India. It is not surprising therefore that issue receded into the background and over time faded from the collective national conscience.

But how do we explain the phenomenon that each December it surfaces briefly and is again relegated to back of our national conscience. After all there was nothing that kept subsequent governments in Bangladesh from seeking recourse in the International Criminal Court later, once it was set up. The simple truth is and it is a very uncomfortable one, every post liberation Bangladesh government, including AL ones, past and present, accorded low priority to this particular trauma that the nation suffered. They, whether elected or otherwise, are all guilty of inaction in this matter.

Political Expediency

The trial and bringing to justice of the assassins of Bangabandhu subsumed every issue, at least during Prime Minister Hasina terms of office. Even the trial of those involved in the murder in jail of the top AL leaders and Bangabandhu close associates fell by the wayside. It is difficult not to conclude that cynical political expediency continues to determine the course that the present government has embarked on. The present AL leadership views the nation through the lens of us and them dividing and polarizing the national polity, in the process hastening the demise of the values that energized the War of Liberation.

Forty two years later, on December 14, 2013, we have witnessed another travesty of democracy and a mockery of the very same ideals and values of our martyred intellectuals and freedom fighters. The government of the daughter of the man who embodied our freedom struggle has (it appears, again at the behest of a domineering neighbour) forced down the throat of this nation a farcical election in which 154 members of Parliament have already been declared elected without a single vote being cast.

If the current course of events is played out according to the Prime Minister wishes, on Jan 5 2014, another 146 public representatives will be elected by the people of Bangladesh and we will have a Parliament with a majority of public representatives who will hold office without a single voter having trekked to a polling booth. Yet our free press, electronic media and later day intellectuals who pontificate and celebrate the successes of this government do not find anything wrong with this turn of politics in our country. Our founding fathers, martyred freedom fighters and the ordinary citizens who died in this noble cause are surely turning in anguish in their resting places. Are we then living through the best of times or the worst of times?