DHAKA/NEW DELHI, Feb 6: Bangladesh on Thursday lodged a protest with India’s acting envoy saying that “false and fabricated comments” by deposed prime minister Sheikh Hasina are a “hostile act” against Dhaka, a day after she delivered a virtual address to her supporters from exile in India.
While Hasina was delivering the speech on Wednesday night, protesters vandalised and set on fire her father and Bangladesh founder Sheikh Mujibur Rahman’s residence in Dhaka. Similar cases of vandalism also took place at several other places, targeting Awami League leaders.
“We called India’s deputy high commissioner (Pawan Badhe), as the high commissioner was not here, and handed him our protest note,” foreign affairs adviser M Touhid Hossain told reporters at a briefing at his office.
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He described Hasina’s recent statements as “highly aggressive”, suggesting that they could have offended the sentiments of the younger generation.
Hossain said Dhaka previously urged New Delhi to prevent her from engaging in such activities, “but we did not receive any response”.
He said that the foreign ministry on Thursday once again conveyed its objections. “We will observe what actions India takes,” he added.
Separately, the foreign ministry in a statement said it asked India “to immediately take appropriate measures, in the spirit of mutual respect and understanding, to stop her from making such false, fabricated and incendiary statements using social media and other communications while she is in India”.
The foreign ministry said it lodged a “strong protest with the Government of India over the false fabricated comments and statements continuously being made in different platforms including social media, by the former prime minister Sheikh Hasina, instigating instability in Bangladesh”.
The protest note, handed over to the Indian diplomat, conveyed the “deep concern, disappointment and serious reservation” of Bangladesh, as such statements are “hurting the sentiments” of the people in the country, the statement said.
The ministry also emphasised that such activities by her, are considered as a “hostile act towards Bangladesh and are not conducive to the efforts at establishing a healthy relationship between the two countries”.
Hasina, 77, has been living in India since August 5 last year, when she fled Bangladesh following a massive student-led protest that toppled her Awami League’s 16-year regime.
In her speech, Hasina called upon the countrymen to organise a resistance against the current regime.
Just before her speech, protesters rallied outside Sheikh Mujibur Rahman’s 32 Dhanmondi house in Dhaka following a social media call for a “bulldozer procession”. The mob set the house on fire.
The building in the adjacent plot, which had housed the offices of several Awami League outfits, was also demolished. The violent demonstrators also defaced murals depicting Sheikh Mujibur Rahman.
Hasina, in a slightly emotion-choked voice, said Pakistani troops too looted the house during the 1971 Liberation War but did not demolish or set it on fire.
“Today, this house is being demolished. What crime had it committed? Why were they so afraid of the house… I seek justice from the people of the country. Didn’t I do anything for you?” she said.
“They can demolish a building, but not the history… but they must also remember that history takes its revenge,” Hasina said.
“They are yet to have the strength to destroy the national flag, the constitution and the independence that we earned at the cost of lives of millions of martyrs with a bulldozer,” she said in an apparent reference to the Muhammad Yunus-led interim government.
The residence of Hasina’s late husband Wajed Mian known as ‘Sudha Sadan’ on Road 5 in Dhanmondi was also set on fire by protesters.
Protesters also demolished the home of her cousins – Sheikh Helal Uddin and Sheikh Salauddin Jewel – in Khulna City.
Protesting students removed the name of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman from Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman Hall of Dhaka University.
In Chattogram, protesters defaced Sheikh Mujibur Rahman’s murals at Chittagong Medical College and in the city’s Jamal Khan area.
Protesters also vandalised murals of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman near the Circuit House ground in Mymensingh city and at the National Poet Kazi Nazrul Islam University in Trishal.
The mayhem on Wednesday began after Anti-Discrimination Students Movement leader Hasnat Abdullah wrote on his verified Facebook account: “Tonight, Bangladesh will be liberated from the place of pilgrimage for fascism.”
Responding to a question on international media coverage on the violence, Hossain said, “We anticipate negative reactions, including concerns over the destruction at Dhanmondi 32. But we consider this an expression of public anger”.
Replying to a query on the fate of the existing agreements with India, Hossain said that the deal with the Adani Group was not in Bangladesh’s best interest.
Meanwhile, a key adviser of Bangladesh’s interim government on Thursday urged citizens to shift their focus from “destructive” actions to constructive initiatives after protestors targeted properties.
“We are facing regional and global hegemony, not just mere structures. (So) Instead of breaking idols, we must build counter-ideals, power, and hegemony,” said Mahfuz Alam in a Facebook post.
Hasina’s father is widely viewed as an independence hero, but anger at his daughter has tarnished his legacy. He was killed along with most of his family members in a coup staged by a group of junior or mid-ranking military officers on August 15, 1975. Hasina and her sister Rehana survived as they were in Germany.
Bangladesh International Crimes Tribunal (ICT) has issued arrest warrants for Hasina and several former Cabinet ministers, advisers, and military and civil officials for “crimes against humanity and genocide”.
In December, Bangladesh officially sought Hasina’s repatriation to stand trial on charges of mass killings during the Anti-Discrimination Student’s Movement dubbed as the July-August uprising.
The ICT, originally formed to try the hardened collaborators of atrocities of Pakistani troops during its 1971 Liberation War, has issued two arrest warrants ordering authorities to arrest her and ensure her court appearance by February 12 as she was also accused of enforced disappearances during her rule. (PTI)
