Your political game, our death
Mozammel H. Khan
There are two news items in The Daily Star, both on the front page. One under the heading, " Arson: Victim loses battle for life after 4 days." The other under the titled, "Abdin Assaulted: Court orders for probe."
The news of the former says, "Mosharraf Hossain, the only breadwinner of a six-member family, succumbed yesterday to burns he suffered when miscreants torched a truck in Natore on Wednesday during hartal hours. Mango trader Mosharraf and two others were injured when a band of six to seven persons set fire to a mango-laden truck on Natore-Dhaka highway at the district headquarters around 11:30pm Wednesday, the first day of the 48-hour shutdown called by BNP and its allies."
Mosharraf's fault was to defy the hartal imposed by the main opposition alliance for the greater "benefit of the masses." Mosharraf being one of those "toiling" masses could not save himself even though he did not venture at broad day light and instead chose to drive his truck at dark hours of night just prior to midnight.
No, Mosharraf was not fortunate enough to get any visitation from anyone, neither government or nor the opposition, nor for that matter from any foreign diplomats or human rights groups, let alone any financial help while he was fighting for his life at the hospital.
According to his family, "Tk.2 lac worth of the mangoes he bought have been lost and they have already borrowed Tk.50,000 to bear the expenses of his treatment."
The second news, outcome of the same hartal that stated: "A Dhaka court yesterday ordered the Dhaka Metropolitan Police commissioner to take legal action, upon investigation, against the policemen responsible for the assault on Opposition Chief Whip Zainul Abdin Farroque."
The plaintiff, a fellow MP of Mr. Farroque's own party told the TV reporter, "I filed this case to invoke the conscience of the 15 crores people of this country to tell them how repressive this government is that a front ranking opposition lawmaker could not escape the wrath of the members of the law enforcing authority."
Like his fellow party colleagues, from Tetulia to Teknaf, he termed the incident "unprecedented." Even a Dhaka University Professor in a press analysis termed the incident "unprecedented" and in his view he has never seen such an oppressive regime; seemingly eclipsing his memory to what happened to Mohammed Nasim, a former home minister, and the mayhem that the BNP-Jamat government carried out following the October general election of 2001 on the opposition supporters and members of the religious minorities.
Unlike Mosharraf, Farroque was privileged to get the visitations of score of his party men including his own party chief, other sympathetic politicians, and even the diplomats of two of the most powerful nations on our planet, a rare honour for the opposition chief whip.
Obviously, Mosharraf was not born with such a fortune, since the visits of the honourable diplomats were obviously guided by politics not humanity.
Both the incidents, the manhandling of Farroque by the police and death of Mosharraf in the hands of opposition activists are not unprecedented, irrespective of which of the two political parties is in the helm and which one is in the streets. But the fundamental differences are that Farroques are the major stakeholders of this political game while Mosharraf's are innocent bystanders and are tragic victims of crossfire.
When their party rises to the helm of the state ministerial births are reserved for Farroques, while Mosharrafs never become any party or privy to extortions or tender manipulations, no matter which party wins the political game.
Whether the policemen, those who assaulted Farooque, are brought to book or not, he has already ripped enough political benefit to last the future years of his political career. But for poor Mosharrafs, they lose their inalienable right to lives for the cause for which they are not stakeholders by any stretch. And the families of Mosharrafs' not only lose their near and dear ones but also the loss their breadwinners plunging the families into irreversible calamities.
And their legal suits usually never see the light of the day although Article 27 of the constitution vehemently proclaims: "All citizens are equal before law and are entitled to equal protection of law."
This brings down to the legality and morality of the so-called democratic right "hartal." But is hartal, truly a democratic right, let alone basic right as some carried away analysts term? This is a million dollar question and the answer is most likely to be influenced by the side of the political fence one belongs to.
If one is a supporter of the government of the day, hartal, in his view, is an utterly undemocratic act that infringes on the freedom of an individual. On the other hand, if one has any degree of sympathy for the opposition, it would be the only democratic right under opposition's disposal to protest the undemocratic, if not autocratic, postures of the government.
A person sitting on the political fence will probably agree with the attestation that the hartal, especially the way it is imposed on the people these days is by no means a democratic deed.
Burning a mango-vendor or an auto-rickshaw driver to death is certainly not a democratic exercise by any means. Other than Bangladesh, and a few instances in neighbouring India, this political culture is probably not prevalent in any other part of the world. The question is: Why does it happen in Bangladesh? It is, in fact, an act of desperation on the part of the opposition parties to ventilate their grievances against the wrong doings of the government.
In a parliamentary democracy, the parliament is supposed to be the principal forum where the opposition should raise its voice pointing to the misrule of the government. Both the government and the opposition have to share the blame, probably, at this time opposition carries the lion share of the blame for their continued absence from the parliament.
The most discouraging precedence that happened in the successive elections is that boycott of the parliament did not negatively affect the chance of winning an election by the opposition party, since misrule of the incumbent took the centre-stage in deciding the mandate of the voters.
Our citizens at home are probably too immune to so many of these wrong-doings that the tragic deaths of Mosharraf's do not so much invoke (may be they are helpless) their conscience in asking themselves why these non-stakeholders have to meet fatalities in the recurring political games of the two political rivals.
Sitting thousands of miles away from my homeland and living in one of the finest democratic societies on our planet, my heart profusely bleeds. My heartfelt condolence is for the bereaved, though it hardly lessens the burden of their grief.
The writer is the Convener of the Canadian Committee for Human Rights and Democracy in Bangladesh.
