I won’t call them protesters

Thu Jul 25, 2024 12:24 PM Last update: Thu Jul 25, 2024 12:48 PM

When government institutions were burned, it was obvious that peaceful protesters who were demanding their rights did not carry out the arson. Photo: Anisur Rahman

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When government institutions were burned, it was obvious that peaceful protesters who were demanding their rights did not carry out the arson. Photo: Anisur Rahman

Starting with the mindless attack by the Bangladesh Chhatra League on the peaceful student protest movement at the University of Dhaka on July 15, the following week saw almost daily clashes, not only on campuses but across the country.

Initially, it was devastating to witness the brutality meted out by the law enforcers and ruling party activists to the young students of Dhaka University, Jahangirnagar University, Rajshahi University, Barishal University, Begum Rokeya University, Brac University and several other educational institutions. But at some point, it was obvious that there were hardly any students in the chaos.

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When government institutions like Setu Bhaban and the Department of Disaster Management building, next to which stood a key data centre, were tactically burned down, it became obvious again that peaceful protesters demanding their rights did not carry out the arsons.

It was easy to see that the arson involved long-term planning and the provision of materials, including gunpowder and other flammable materials. When the Narsingdi prison was vandalized, freeing over 800 prisoners and stealing hundreds of weapons, it was further evidence that outside elements had infiltrated the initial peaceful movement for equality. The infiltrators were handed a silver platter when the BCL ensured that violence had taken over the movement.

Since then, I have refused to use the term “protesters” when referring to clashes between groups of police or ruling party activists and anyone who could only be called “rioters.”

There are countless rumors going around — those involved in the current riots are “Jamaat-Shibir people,” they are “people from low-income groups who have been hired as vandals and thugs,” they are “BNP people,” this and that. Perhaps one of these rumors may even be true.

However, they are not “protesters.”

Abu Sayed was a protester.

A single breadwinner from a poor family, with elderly parents and a younger sister, he took to the streets as a student of Begum Rokeya University in Rangpur to fight for his right to a fair chance at a government job. He found himself facing police who mindlessly attacked students and was shot for it, armed only with his sheer courage.

He was a real protester.

The girls and boys who were mercilessly beaten on the University of Denver campus for nonviolent protests, stopped only by the BCL’s “appropriate response,” are real protesters.

The many, many who died in shootings and ruthless police attacks just because they had a voice, just because they wanted a chance at equality – those are the real protesters.

The word protester, to me, is powerful. Every triumph of a nation has come from rigorous and logical protests of people demanding their rights. It was the protesters who secured our right to speak our mother tongue; it was they who led the country to liberation. It was the garment factory protesters who demanded better wages. It was the protesters who demanded road safety. It was the protesters who demanded reform of the discriminatory quota system. And when we use that word so callously against the wrong kind of people, we undermine every protest and every triumph they brought.

Since the first quota reform and the road safety protest in 2018, organised mainly by secondary school and middle school children, the words “student” and “protester” have become almost synonymous for people of this generation, just as they were in 1952.

In 2018 too, the road safety movement was thwarted first by Chhatra League men and then by “entitled quarterbacks” who infiltrated the movement for their own separate agenda. Notice the trend?

Back then, the infiltrators were sometimes also called “andolonkari (protesters)”, as they are now.

For me, being a protester is about being responsible for the future of the country, but if you are determined to destroy the country, you are anything but a protester demanding rights. Then you are just a rebel, a criminal, a saboteur.

I refused to call these people – the rioters, the infiltrators who brazenly exploit logical movements – protesters.

I will not show them the same respect I show Abu Sayed.

The Nazi wretch is a journalist at The Daily Star.

The views expressed in this article are those of the author.

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