Bangladesh has made quite a lot of headway in curbing the scourge of radicalization, with both our law enforcement and intelligence agencies cracking down on and rooting out multiple terror cells, before they could do any damage, in the last few years.
While pro-active measures in tackling militants who have already been radicalized is indeed laudable, it does not get to the heart of the matter and pinpoint how and why these individuals become radicalized to begin with.
To that end, our law enforcement had announced some time ago an initiative that sought to de-radicalize militants who have been brought to book. The initiative, launched by the police’s Counter-Terrorism and Transnational Crime unit, is set to start this month.
However, with the exact details of the initiative still not clear, it is imperative that any efforts towards de-radicalization take a holistic approach, not only the militants who have been brought to book.
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According to research conducted by our law enforcement, 82% off all people arrested for being involved in terrorist activities were found to have been radicalized through social media, especially withing isolated, fringe communities.
It can be hypothesized that the incident where a constable that had accosted a teacher for wearing a teep on her forehead could have been radicalized to some degree into believing that the teacher was doing something “immoral” in his eyes.
If members of our own law enforcement are susceptible to the creeping tentacles of radicalization and eventual militancy, it behooves our administration to truly tackle this issue at its roots.
After all, only by getting to know the underlying philosophy that radicalized them to begin with can we eradicate this scourge once and for all. And, as we all know, radicalization, more often than not, begins at home.
