Punish Them Exemplarily

HOME Minister Mohammad Nasim has done well to identify himself with the public outcry over the barbaric assault on a young woman at the Dhaka University campus during the New Year celebrations. He has held out assurances of an exemplary punishment to the culprits and also a close scrutiny of the on-duty policemen's role at or near the place of occurrence.

There has been a police promptitude to catch the perpetrators as is apparent from the detention of three persons - Jewel, allegedly a member of the ruling AL's student wing BCL and Mamun and Mokhtar, both of them booksellers, who had gone to the police authorities to volunteer information about the incident. All of them appeared enframed in the crucial photograph that the newspapers had published capturing the orgy that even animals are normally incapable of. The police, of course, deserve thanks for acting so swiftly on it.

There are two specific points to make here: first, the photographic and eye witness accounts clearly point to some 20-25 youngmen being involved in the act of sexually harassing the hapless woman at different stages, so that the police action has just about touched the fringe only. The substantive investigation has to begin now with the right tenor set for it. Secondly, on the basis of the photographic evidence, eyewitness accounts or the version of on-duty policemen it should be possible to separate those who had actually pounced on the woman, tugged at her clothes and virtually stri-pped her from those who had apparently shielded the victim eventually taking her to the safety of a police van. The point is that the real culprits must not be allowed to slip through the fingers.

But for the photograph in the print media that captured the faces of the ruffians, it would have been difficult for the police to go after the offenders the way they are doing now. Yet, at the same time, discretion ought to have been applied against being so explicit about the sensitive part of the photograph which amounted to a second-time victimisation of the woman. So, we understand where the sensibilities of the women activists have been hurt.

We want a ruthlessly exemplary punishment meted out to the culprits, regardless of their political colour or connection. It is usually the activists of the ruling party's student wing who dare perpetrate such acts of sexual harassment perversity as the serial rapes in the Jahangirnagar University had proved not long ago. If that had been dealt with an iron hand, we might not have seen the TSC incident. The government needs to face up to the fact, here and now.