The nation in the line of 'crossfire'
Lurking behind the scene?
THE gap between the AL's profession and practice has been widening since it came to power early this year. The people's generous verdict in the last election has indeed given the party enough rope to hang itself. So much so that it has started considering the same people a bunch of cretins who can be taken for granted for all time. No wonder that, in a show of chutzpa, it has reneged from its earlier stands with regard to some of the fundamental things, including the people's rights to rule of law. Coming close on the heels of the Pilkhana bungling (the enquiry reports have raised more questions than they answered) and a distressing price index of the essentials leaving the poor consumers helpless before the traders' corporate skullduggery the sudden spate in extra-judicial killings, particularly of two innocent polytechnic students, in the capital has visibly created fresh consternation in the public psyche. Are we then harking back to much-despised dark years of the BNP-Jamaat regime when, in early 2004, the Rapid Action Batallion (Rab) was raised and in its wake extra-judicial killings came into practice for the first time in the country. It was effected through what came to be feared subsequently as crossfire, encounter and death in custody since then. It may be recalled that the AL went whole hog in opposing the immoral practise. Its opposition to extra-judicial killing, and promise not only to right the wrong but also to bring to book its perpetrators, found expression in the party's election manifesto. After having made an unabashed somersault some stalwarts of the government are now making callous and desultory comments on the practice, mincing words on it and resorting to sophistry, even though their stout defence of a starkly indefensible issue is ironical. The whole mood suggests that the "culture" of crossfirethe pseudonym for extra judicial killingsnow in vogue will take sometimes to be done away with and, in the meantime, the citizenry will have to stomach it. This is in spite of several ministers speaking against it. The strongest observation came from none other than the foreign minister, who categorically said last February before the Human Rights Commission that "the government would show zero tolerance to extra-judicial killings and torture and death in custody." Amid contradictory views in the government itself, extra-judicial killings continue across the countrya trend over which the public is genuinely worried, because the right to be put through the legal procedure is something fundamental and is also recognised in the constitution. Even the worst of the criminals ought to be put through the due process of law instead of being arbitrarily killed by the law enforcing agencies. This is bound to result in the loss of the faith in state authority, which can be boomeranged by the after-effects. What if the public also takes up the law in its own hand? Indeed, we are treading a dangerous course by flouting the country's law and denying it to the people. But the AL is, without a grain of compunction, bent upon doing what all the BNP-Jammat didthe same campus hooliganism as well as grabbing of tenders, big business and lucrative contracts by force. Why should they stop extra-judicial killings if it suits them and their vested interests? The trouble with the AL is that it thinks that whatever its government does in an arbitrary fashion is hunky-dory. The Awamis also think that the people are so forgetful that the sleaze can be easily swept under rug. The people's forgetfulness may be partial but, much more than that, they are forgiving, which is why the AL is back in power with flying colours notwithstanding its past blunders and corruptions. This has emboldened the party to believe that Bangabandhu's legacy will wash off the smear from its face. Any hostile blitz from the media community can be thwarted by his great name. Its nexus with powerful elite will do the magic of managing things. It's hoodlums, who cower in the daylight, can only change the signboards of the country's landmarkswhether it is the Jumuna Bridge or the Novo Theaterunder the cover of darkness. People couldn't care less, but they do want to be far away from the horror of crossfire. The people also want the country to be left untouched by the ignominy of being a failed state. But the first syndrome of a failed state will inescapably appear if the wielders of power prepare a slue through which that syndrome can creep in. If a pack of promises remains unfulfilled by them, and they have indeed taken us for a ride, the unwanted slue is already prepared and there is hardly a way the forces of evil can be prevented from using it.
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