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Writing in the time of autocracy
For a long time, I remained largely detached from the events in Bangladesh as I was focused on my academic pursuits. I didn’t worry much about the political fallout at the local and national level or what was happening in the streets or in the corridors of power. I was mainly a man of the classroom and maintained an apolitical stance in my academic work. I wrote and published works related to my research interests. I thought then—as I do now—that by producing academic work, I would hopefully make lasting contributions to my field of knowledge which would benefit generations of learners.
At one point, I received casual and seemingly innocuous comments from some of my friends and acquaintances. Referring to the situations in Bangladesh, they expressed doubts about the efficacy of producing scholarly work that does not give meaning, or is not sensitive, to la condition humaine . What they said amounts to this: long-term academic work may have its own value, but how can an academic remain indifferent to the pain of tens of millions of their compatriots under a brutal regime? Or, how could we not raise concerns when massive corruption plagued all state machineries? Or, how long could we remain silent when our country was being plundered and large sums of our money siphoned off to foreign shores by an autocratic government and its cronies?
For a while, I quietened such whisperings of conscience and continued focusing on my armchair intellectual work which was largely disconnected from the immediate here and now. But my subconscious mind continued speaking to me and sending me messages.
As I visited Bangladesh or spoke with the people of the country and its diasporas, it was obvious that something went terribly wrong in our motherland. People were in constant fear. Anyone could be apprehended by the security forces or forcefully disappeared from their homes or from the streets—during the day or in the middle of the night. Anyone could be fired from their job, their businesses could be ransacked, or their properties could be grabbed. Or, anyone could be harassed or beaten to death in the streets. One simple statement was enough for the security forces or for the ruling party ruffians to justify all such cases of human rights violations: the victim belonged to one of the opposition parties to whom the Hasina-led regime directed its ferocious fury and repressive measures.
We have some numbers or have heard stories about people who were killed or subjected to enforced disappearances during Hasina’s autocracy, which lasted for fifteen and a half years. Thanks to the media, we were also fed with some information about the victims of the weaponisation of the law on Hasina’s watch.
But it is difficult to put a number on those innumerable Bangladeshis who lived in fear or had a peripatetic life inside and outside the country, as they went into hiding to escape police arrest or torture by the thugs of the ruling party. It is hard to record how many expatriate Bangladeshis didn’t visit their beloved birthplace, as they feared persecution. Their crime might have been some of their social media posts which could be interpreted as criticisms of the government. Many other expatriate Bangladeshis didn’t visit their country simply because of a sense of insecurity that would grip them inside the country once they left the airport.
All these kept disquieting me. Then the “What can I do?” question was also insurmountable. It somewhat paralysed me and made me feel helpless. It was a real let-down.
I found an answer in the end. Yes, I could write to protest against the evils of autocracy. However, it was going to be a challenging task for two main reasons. First, it would take away much of my research time. But I was confident that I would be able to address this through better time management.
The second issue was unpredictable, more serious and beyond my control—writing against the autocratic government would compromise my security. How would I avoid the wrath of a regime that was fundamentally unjust and used enforced disappearances as a tactic to silence dissent?
The government subjected the writer and artist Mushtaq Ahmed (1967–2021) to nine-month long slow death in police custody. By this, the regime wanted to send a forewarning message to all other writers who might have contemplated exposing its human rights violations and financial corruptions.
Many capable intellectuals and opinion leaders heeded the message and remained silent. They prioritised their own safety and comfort over the independence of their mind and their sense of responsibility to the nation. Some of them continued writing but never touched on the wrongdoings of the government. They explored the aesthetics of flora and fauna or the serenity of lakes, and similar bland subjects. Others provided epistemic cover-ups to Hasina’s autocracy by seeking to establish moral equivalence between the then and previous governments. The enthusiasts among them eulogised the regime for its mega development projects without touching on their high pricing and massive corruption through which people in the government pocketed money with both hands.
The toadies and lickspittles among the intellectual elites went further; they started to panegyrise the government hoping for positions, perks or privileges. They helped embolden the regime and allowed it to continue repressing the people of Bangladesh. About such a greedy educated gentry lacking strength of character, poet-philosopher Muhammad Iqbal (1877-1938) said, “This hungry man bartered away his soul for a piece of bread and caused us great grief thereby.”
I couldn’t bring myself to follow the example of such well-positioned intellectuals devoid of moral convictions.
Long story short, I got over material and psychological obstacles and began writing for Bangladeshi English dailies. By doing so, I was heeding the call of conscience. The alternative was not to write about the regime’s corruptions and injustices on the people. Had I made that choice, the pangs of conscience would have outweighed the temptation to inhabit a comfort zone which is free from the pitfalls of the world that often beset the best among us.