Jamaat-Shibir violence paralyses economy

Ashes, charred wood and tin are all that remain of three large-sized grocery shops at Fakirhat in Balipara, a village in Pirojpur's Zianagar upazila, following an attack by unidentified miscreants on November 7. The photo was taken recently. Photo: Tawfique Ali

Nearly all economic activities at Pirojpur's Zianagar upazila, a stronghold of the war crimes convict Delawar Hossain Sayedee, came to a standstill in the last two months due to mayhem by the opposition.
During an extensive tour through Zianagar, Indurkani, Kalaia, Sayeedkhali, Dhepsabunia, Bhabanipur, Balipara and Chandipur on Thursday, the villages looked ghostly with an uneasy calm and sparse presence of customers and traders at the bazars. 
Around 500 local transports of rickshaw vans, rental motorbikes, Tomtoms (a locally devised transport), battery-run rickshaws and a dozen inter-district buses remain off the 15 kilometre Zianagar-Chandipur road, a vital thoroughfare across the upazila.   
The last two months saw many murders, hackings, lynching, severing of tendons, gauging out of eyes and lethal undercover attacks particularly in the villages of Balipara, Sayeedkhali (originally Southkhali) and Chandipur allegedly by Jamaat-BNP men.      
This situation is prevailing despite increased drives by law enforcers, including Rapid Action Battalion and Border Guard Bangladesh, against miscreants. 
“We carry out raids and searches in the morning, midday and midnight at different places every day to keep the criminals at bay,” said Pirojpur Superintendent of Police SM Akhtaruzzaman. 
“In addition, several police camps have been set up in different unions so that they cannot gather strength…We arrested nearly 80 suspected criminals in the past weeks alone,” he said.    
An elderly Hakim Hawladar, whom The Daily Star met at Kalaia, said, “Over 90 percent of the locals blindly love Sayedee because of his religious sermons.” 
“It is primarily they who carried out the attacks, arson, vandalism and mutilations mainly on the ruling Awami League men as a ruthless retaliation,” he said.
Hakim said the outrage in the upazila centred around the trial of Sayedee as a war criminal whom he claimed is “an innocent person”. 
Zahid Hossain Razu, an SSC examinee of the village, also described the local environment.
“Any hartal and blockade is enforced brutally in our locality, totally disconnecting the upazila from the rest of the district,” he said.   
“It is not safe at all for any outsider to visit the area as an unfamiliar face may come under attack anytime,” he added. 
Alleged Jamaat-Shibir men on November 25 hacked three Jubo League men with sharp weapons at Khaerhat, just a quarter kilometre away from Sayedee's house in Sayeedkhali. 
The attackers stabbed Akman Sarder, vice-president of Jubo League Balipara union, in the eyes and severed tendons of a ward unit Jubo League president, Bahadur Khan.
Bahadur's cousin Ruma Akhtar notes, “The situation is so frightening that I along with my elderly mother dare not stay home at night.”       
Shawpon Shil, a Jubo League activist and a barber by profession, was killed on October 27 at Balipara Bazar during a hartal. 
Unidentified miscreants hacked Mostofa Hawlader, a witness in Sayedee's case, early morning on December 8 at Hoglabunia village. Mostofa succumbed to his injuries later.  
On December 12, opposition activist Sukkur Ali was shot at Ghosherhat as an alleged Awami League leader opened fire on a BNP-Jamaat procession protesting hanging of war criminal Abdul Quader Mollah. Sukkur died the following day.     
Talking to The Daily Star at Indurkani Bazar, a local Bangladesh Chhatra League leader, Masud Ahmed Rana, said most of the leaders and activists of Awami League and its affiliated organisations have fled in fear of attacks.  
“People are deeply horrified and do not come out of their houses unless it is an urgent need…The law enforcers deployed to maintain law and order are themselves in panic,” he said. 
Zianagar unit Jamaat Secretary Abdul Hai, however, blamed the ruling party for all the crimes. 
“We have been ousted from the locality by ruling party men and accused in hundreds of police cases…how could have we committed such crimes?” he said.   
But contrary to his claims, this correspondent saw a few shops owned by ruling party men left vandalised and looted and a tin-shed party office overturned at Dhepchabunia, close to Sayedee's home.