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Date: 27th December 2013
These are surely the worst of times although these are supposed to be the best of times with the hanging of Qader Mollah. Instead of mass upsurge of celebrations, the hanging has pushed the country into a newer and higher level of conflict with Jamat-Shibir acts of violence all over the country. The rejoicing over the hanging has been muted because the vast majority of the people who wanted Qader Mollah and his cohorts tried and given the severest punishment under the law, feared the costs of the hanging in the country current tryst with a near civil war like situation would be too much.
When Qader Mollah was given the reprieve from a death sentence early in February this year, hundreds of thousands of men, women and children from all walks of life made their way to Shahabag to express their solidarity with the demand made from there by the Projonmo for death sentence for the accused. The humongous gathering underscored the fact unequivocally that the issue of the trial of the war criminals was a national issue. In fact, in a country that has seen little unity on national issues since liberation because of the nature of politics, the unity demonstrated from Shahabag on the demand for hanging of QM and other accused in the trial of the war criminals was qualitatively the same as the nation had shown when Bangabandhu gave the call for the country independence in 1971.
Sadly, a movement that had promised so much in the first few days it exploded lost its national appeal because it became controversial and partisan. The movement failed to judge the religious sentiments of the people by ignoring the anti-Islam and anti Prophet Mohammad (pbuh) postings in the blogs of some of the leaders of the Shahabag Projonmo. The religious fundamentalists turned the movement upside down by publicizing these grossly offensive postings. Once people became aware of these postings, they deserted Shahabag. The ruling party patronization and the media that kept the Shahabag movement going but its mass appeal left them on the issue of Islam.
Thus when Qader Mollah death sentence was passed not even a small part of the people went there to welcome the death sentence. And when Qader Mollah was hanged, there were even fewer people at Shahabag because by the time the hanging took place, the apprehension and the concern among the people was all about reprieve from the civil war like situation to which the country was sliding over the issue of holding the national elections. Therefore, the AL led government that had done such a great job with the trials failed to unite the people with the hanging of Qader Mollah because of its stubbornness to hold one-party elections against popular will.
The hanging of Qader Mollah and the muted nature of public enthusiasm has been a reflection of current reality in Bangladesh where the lives of the people have been marginalized in a manner where they are in no mood to rejoice over a hanging that the AL led government has been trying to establish as more important than any other issue for the people which it no longer is. The people, while committed to punish the war criminals, want the country to come back on its rails. They are praying as they have not prayed since 1971 for an election in which the AL and the BNP would both participate because they believe that without an inclusive national election, the country would bleed to death. They fear that the hanging on GM and if more are to follow would further de-stabilize politics and hasten the country ruin.
The resolution taken in the Pakistan parliament has given the hanging of Qader Mollah, ironically, a new lease of life in Bangladesh. The spontaneous public anger over the resolution has again been taken over by the Shahabag Movement to give the issue of the trial of the war criminals a new spin after it had failed to gain the sort of public approval with the hanging that it and the ruling party, working in tandem, had expected. The resolution that has been adopted has not been unanimous and the PPP and the MQM have opposed it. On behalf of the ruling Muslim League that supported the resolution, Home Minister Chaudhury Nissar Ali has said: We respect independence and sovereignty of Bangladesh but there should be a policy of forgive and forget.” There is a historical reference in the Minister words that made the Minister stress the words forgive and forget that Bangladesh must have forgotten.
In 1973, Bangladesh had signed the Tripartite Agreement with India and Pakistan. Article 15 of the Agreement has stated: having regard to the appeal of the Prime Minister of Pakistan to the people of Bangladesh to forgive and forget the mistakes of the past, the Foreign Minister of Bangladesh stated that the Government of Bangladesh had decided not to proceed with the trials as an act of clemency. It was agreed that the 195 prisoners of war might be repatriated to Pakistan along with the other prisoners of war now in the process of repatriation under the Delhi Agreement.
Now 40 years afterwards, the Bangladesh Government is demanding an apology from Pakistan for adopting a resolution on Qader Mollah after signing an international treaty to forgive and forget the crimes of the masterminds of the 1971 Bangladesh Genocide. Those who would look at the matter dispassionately would be entitled to ask the question on how Bangladesh would defend its present position against Pakistan for a resolution on Qader Mollah having spared the trials of those 195 war criminals in a spirit of forget and forgive. However this does not in anyway explain the insensitive resolution taken in Pakistan parliament that must be condemned in the strongest possible terms. At the same time, the Tripartite Agreement of 1973 puts the Bangladesh Government in an embarrassing situation for pushing the issue to the extent being demanded by Shahabag and its supporters.
At a time when the opposition is not allowed any right of democratic protest, the government has allowed Shahabag to proceed close to the Pakistan High Commission. Unfortunately again for the ruling party, these moves are not gaining any traction in the ground although with the Pakistan resolution, there is great anger in the hearts of every Bangladeshi. The reason is a very simple one. The present reality of politics in Bangladesh is that the people are now concerned with just one issue because it is a matter of life and death for them, namely an inclusive national election to save the country from sliding towards becoming a failed state.
It is time for those pushing for hanging of the war criminals and now with Pakistan resolution to pause and come to grips with political reality. Unfortunately, they are not and one of their leaders recently demanded that supporters of Jamat, Shibir and Hefazat should be shot at sight and killed by the law enforcing agencies where Hefazat has not been involved in the acts of violence taking place at present. This was what the Pakistan military and those accused in the war crimes did to us in 1971. Those who have led the demand of the trials of the war criminals have done a great job. Unfortunately, they are exposing their hands by putting into a national issue an agenda of their own for which the majority of the people of the country have no support, namely going after those who support and speak for Islam. Jamat is a political problem for Bangladesh; its acts of violence notwithstanding. Political problems have nowhere in history been resolved by the barrel of the gun. It is time to reflect on this historical truth.
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