A friend of mine was recently educating me on the theme of this year’s International Women’s Day: “Accelerate Action -- it’s an alliteration” she articulated, while wiping the sweat off her brow after yet another tiring day of wage slavery at a multinational conglomerate that would sooner see her pass out from exhaustion than respect her rights as a human, let alone as a woman.
Much like the rest of the world, Bangladeshis also observe International Women’s Day, and this year our country chose to do so by granting bail to one Mostafa Asif Arnob, a Dhaka University employee who was arrested in connection with the harassment of a female student at the campus premises. Now, there is a clip of the man being interviewed (ostensibly by Kaaler Kontho) wafting around in the miasmic ether that is Facebook, where he briefly lays out how and why he did what he did, a very rough self-translated transcript of which I am providing below:
Mostafa Asif Arnob: “I mean her orna was here [points near the top of his neck] and I just said to her ‘please lower it a bit, apu’ -- I never said anything like ‘look how large your breasts are,’ I never meant it in a way that could be considered profane …”
Not one for self awareness, then, at least that much has been established.
Frankly speaking, as far as women being harassed is concerned, this is way down the ladder even on an everyday basis. You don’t have to take my word for it -- just approach any women in your life who aren’t confined to a life at home and you are bound to realize just how much of a poison swamp Bangladesh can be for them. Comments about choice of clothing are a dime a dozen, just wait till you find out what the stats say about the state of intimate partner violence and marital rape in Bangladesh.
No, what truly defined the headlines surrounding this entire affair was the protest launched by the group which has officially chosen to identify itself as “Tawhidi Janata,” a ragtag group of Islamist extremists which had arrived into the scene sometime near the latter half of the past decade with reported ties to the Bangladesh chapter of Hefazat-e-Islam (for more insight into the group’s misguided political and religious philosophy, please read Zeeshan Khan’s excellent op-ed titled ‘Commander of the Faithful.’)
After Arnob had been handed over to the police, the station where he was being held was reportedly besieged by the members of the aforementioned group, who had managed to infiltrate the police station questioning the arrest at the top of their lungs and “insisting” on his prompt release for his proven charges. And now we find ourselves here, Arnob being released on bail with him potentially getting his old job back and the victim of his righteous sartorial policing retracting the harassment case citing “pressure” to do so.
The inaction displayed by the current administration verges on weaponized incompetence
When the interim government cabinet was first announced, the entirety of Bangladesh (discounting those who have a habit of being played into our culture of party politics) was once again imbued with a sense of hope for their country, a country which had been left ravaged and held together with spit and scotch-tape by the robber barons which constituted the brunt of Sheikh Hasina’s successive cabinets post-2013. And yet, once again, all we get in return is simply more disappointment, as the government’s approach to tackling the void in law and order has been nothing if not shambolic.
Yes, we understand that undoing a decade and a half of institutional rot is going to take time, we understand that the economy is going to undergo a period of immense pressure before it can start growing again -- what is absolutely beyond the realm of comprehension, however, is the lack of any conviction on the part of law enforcement and indeed the ministries relevant to the issue of internal security.
It is unacceptable that a mob could simply enter a police station without any friction whatsoever, just as it is unacceptable that a pair of women could be physically assaulted for the audacity to smoke in public. An incident that, in a moment of shocking incompetence, was responded to by the interim adviser to the home ministry with a reminder that smoking in public is an offense that extends to both men and women.
The inaction displayed by the current administration verges on weaponized incompetence, and is tantamount to killing its own citizens softly as it only works to further embolden elements such as religious extremists and the politically motivated.
The more things change, the more they stay the same.
And yet, hope still lingers. Despite the void in law and order, I personally still have faith that the interim government is on the right track -- but it could most certainly stand to take a few pointers from this year’s women’s day and accelerate action.
Rubaiyat Kabir is Joint Editor, Editorial and Op-Ed, Dhaka Tribune.
