Tara Mia and the story of a warped conscience
We live in a world where things are constantly happening. Every day seems like an assault on our mental stability because of the nature of the events that take place, more so for a writer who has to go through the unpleasantness of trying to connect the dots and produce an analysis of them. Below is my collection of a few disjointed thoughts on several incidents that emerged recently.
First, many of you may have seen The Daily Star photo of Tara Mia, who was charged in a police case for "attacking" the law enforcement agency. A cursory glance at the photo will reveal that Tara Mia's right hand is completely unusable, a birth defect which resulted in his hand being unusually curved and scrawny and longer than usual. So he has to make do with his left hand—a poor substitute—to do everything that an able person does with both hands. A pauper who lives by begging, this disabled man has somehow gathered the strength to hold "machetes, hockey sticks and iron rods" and use them to assault the police. You may find it hard to believe, but apparently, our police force is a big believer in miracles.
Second, it is often said that the police are not praised as much as they are criticised. How true is it? Only days ago, police recovered the stolen scooter of now-well-known ride-sharing hero Shahanaj Akhter. Were they not praised for it? Indeed, they were. They were showered with praise and admiration from all quarters even though, quite frankly, it was their job to do so.
In another case, a female staff member of Channel 24 was about to be harassed in Banani when she was rescued by an off-duty police officer. He came forward to help out of a sense of moral obligation. For this act of selfless service, the entire police department was praised. As well as the accolades, one thing that came up in the public discourse—as it always does after every such act—is that police can do whatever they "want", something that they have proved on multiple occasions. The question, here, is about when they want it and when they do not. The police were able to identify and arrest the helmeted men at Paltan because they wanted to. They didn't arrest the helmeted men at Zigatola because they didn't want to, and they couldn't be nudged into action even after the media made their job easier by identifying some of the criminals. The police are criticised because of the political motive at work behind this selective use of authority.
Third, what was the role of the police after the rape of a mother-of-four in Noakhali's Subarnachar? In their defence, the police authorities might say that all the accused in this case have been arrested. True, the accused were arrested from different places in which they were hiding. It was a praiseworthy job, but did the police stand by the victim after she lodged the rape complaint? The victim brought specific allegations against one Ruhul Amin whose people, she said, had threatened her against casting vote for BNP's "sheaf of paddy" and insisted that she should vote for Awami League's "boat". The police, however, didn't even mention Ruhul Amin's name in the FIR and instead had her illiterate husband sign the document that cited "pre-existing feud" as the reason for the rape. Why did the police concoct an excuse by ignoring the victim's statement? Even the National Human Rights Commission sought to ignore the victim's statement while its chairman made self-contradictory comments about it. All this can be construed as an exercise in discrediting claims about the political nature of the crime and its connection with the December 30 election.
Four, in Noakhali's Kabirhat upazila, a mother-of-three was gang-raped. And here, too, the role of police and a possible political motive behind the crime came to the fore. The victim is the wife of a BNP activist who was arrested before the election in a case filed in connection with a violent scuffle between Awami League and BNP men. Incidentally, the said violence occurred on the day when BNP leader Moudud Ahmed came under attack by Awami League activists. These are all reported facts. The local BNP unit alleged that the victim's husband was implicated in the case because of his political affiliation and that the same people who manufactured the charges against him also raped his wife. These rapists have a political identity, too, and the police were accused of trying to sweep it under the rug.
The trauma that a rape victim has to go through is unimaginable but the experience of having to relive it again through subsequent assaults on her dignity and security can be equally traumatic. It's outrageous when the society places the burden of proof on the victim—not on those who are responsible for that. The medical examination produces no evidence if the accused is one with powerful connections. We have seen a replay of this episode too many times in the past.
Five, Tara Mia has secured a six-month bail but there is no telling what will happen to him after six months. After the news of the Subarnachar rape victim—Parul Begum—emerged, one expatriate Bangladeshi living in Singapore gave her Tk 3 lakh to buy an auto-rickshaw. But will it heal the scars etched in her mind? What about the Kabirhat rape victim—what will she do now? She will have to bear the trauma of being "punished" for no fault of her own and prove that she was indeed raped.
There are thousands of Tara Mias and Parul Begums spread across our country. They are the face of the common man—the workers, the farmers and all the other nameless and faceless people who collectively keep the wheels of our society turning. These are the very people who took up arms to fight in the War of Liberation. Many of them didn't get the chance to study but they are not without feelings or conscience. I wish I could say the same about those of us who are educated—members of the privileged class, who are traumaexpected to do the right thing and make the right decision.
The fact is, we can deny all the allegations and blabber on about how we're still "the best" and "most beautiful" and so on, because we have the pen and the skills to use it, and say anything we want to say even if it's not true. We have mastered the art of disguising falsehoods as truths and vice versa. But history shows us that Hitler's spin doctor Joseph Goebbels did the same thing to justify their action, and look how the oppressed rose in the end and threw them in the gutters of history. Those of us who are now oppressing the likes of Tara Mia and Parul Begum, emboldened by the same toxic influence of power, should remember that the wheel of time is bound to turn one day. History will remember us for what we did.
Golam Mortoza is a journalist.
The article was translated from Bangla by Badiuzzaman Bay.