The brutality shown by the police outside DMP HQ on Sunday is utterly unacceptable.
At least 25 people were injured when police charged batons against the students who were protesting the failure by authorities to effectively follow up leads on those responsible for the series of sexual assaults at Dhaka University during Pohela Boishakh celebrations.
It is one thing to disperse an unruly crowd, it is quite another to use the kind of excessive and disproportionate force that the police did.
Even worse were the vicious assaults on unarmed and defenseless individual protesters. There must be zero tolerance for this kind of atrocity, and those guilty of it have no business being in uniform.
It is inexcusable that police should behave in such a manner. The protest organisers have been peacefully demonstrating on this issue for weeks. Their demonstration on Sunday was legitimately organised and announced in advance.
Many questions are raised by the disproportionately violent manner in which the police dispersed this demonstration, which led to dozens of people being injured, including five police officers.
Nobody, not just innocent protesters. should have to endure such a disproportionate use of force.
Most important of all, there is the basic matter of how the police treats the public. Law enforcers must remember that they are public servants.
Members of the public have a right to hold the police to account for the failure to bring the Pohela Boishakh attackers to justice. The police’s inability to prevent crime occurred on Bangla New Year is bad enough. Their evident inability or unwillingness to bring the perpetrators to justice raises the issue of just what it is they are good for.
We got an answer on Sunday: Not much except for brutally assaulting law-abiding citizens exercising their democratic rights.