Six years have passed since the Liberation War Affairs Ministry took an exemplary initiative to honour the fallen heroes of the country by identifying and preserving the burial sites of martyred freedom fighters.
But like many other government projects, bureaucratic tangles continue to stagnate the project as officials try to pass blame on each other.
According to a government gazette published in 2013, there are 2,938 sites where freedom fighters had been laid to rest. Under the preservation project, it was one of the primary tasks of authorities concerned to verify the authenticity of the burial grounds before preservation work could begin.
But after six years of efforts, only around half – 1,478 sites – have been verified so far.
Since 2010, the Liberation War Affairs Ministry has been working to develop and preserve the burial sites of martyred freedom fighters.
The initiative came following a 2009 High Court verdict asking the government to preserve all identified killing fields or mass burial grounds of freedom fighters.
The ministry blames the deputy commissioners of 64 districts for not cooperating in identifying the graves. “Some of the district executives have not yet completed the identification of graves,” said Liberation War Affairs Secretary MA Hannan.
“We will not prepare the development pro forma for the martyred freedom fighter project without verifying each of the grave across the country in accordance with the gazette,” Hannan said, pointing out that more time would be needed as the project was of a sensitive nature.
But freedom fighters say the bureaucratic triangle of the minister, secretary and DCs concerned should all share the blame for delaying the initiative.
Ministry and district officials were not interested in preserving the graves of martyrs as those bureaucrats were neither freedom fighters themselves nor sons of martyrs, said SM Mujibul Rahman, the assistant administrative secretary of Bangladesh Muktijoddha Sangsad.
It would only take little funding to preserve the burial grounds as designs for all the sites would be identical, said Mujibul, who fought in Gopalganj during the war.