Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina puts consoling arms around the shoulders of Laila Khatun, widow of police constable Hazrat Ali, at a programme at Osmani Memorial Auditorium in the capital on Saturday. Ali was killed in a Jamaat-Shibir attack on a police outpost in Gaibandha last year. BSS Photo Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina on Saturday urged major opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party to practise healthy politics by shunning political vendetta and the path of violence and confrontation. “Don’t play ducks and drakes with the fate of the people…Don’t kill people anymore and don’t be cheerful pushing their lives into darkness,” she said while unveiling a photo album ‘Blood-stained Bangladesh’ that featured the mayhem by the BNP-Jamaat axis centring the Jan 5 polls and war crimes trial. Hinting at BNP, Hasina said BNP and Jamaat have been playing with the lives of the people in the name of movement and killing people one after another. She premier said BNP was born out of bloodshed and the armed forces experienced 19 coups after the assassination of Bangabandhu. “BNP grabbed state power through bloodshed. So, they love to play ‘Holi’ with blood,” she told the event organised by the ruling Awami League at Osmani Memorial Auditorium where dozens of victims, including women, were present. Blasting the atrocities before the polls, the premier said the only work of Jamaat and Shibir is to create mayhem. They did the same thing in 1971. “Those who kill people in the name of political actions don’t believe in true politics, democracy, constitution and independence,” she said, claiming that attempts were made to snatch away democratic norms. “What do they give to the country and its people?” she queried. Urging the countrymen to remain alert against the BNP-Jamaat mayhem in the name of movement, Hasina said her government does not want to experience such violence anymore. Portraying some brutal incidents during the period, she said several thousand bitter incidents took place in the country and several hundred people, including many army, BGB and police personnel, were killed. “You [lawmen] have to remain alert so that such acts don’t recur anymore.” “We have been working for the people who are in peace,” the premier said, posing questions to such barbaric attacks. “Why are such attacks being made? Are they [attacks] only to make somebody happy?” Criticising the mayhem, Hasina said they created mayhem only to foil the polls. “Political parties may make a decision whether they would take part in polls or not. What kind of politics it is to kill people through arson to foil the polls.” Comparing the BNP-Jamaat atrocities with those by Pakistanis during the liberation war, the premier said she would stand by the families of the victims who had lost their lives in violence. “At least, I must do something for them because none would feel better than me the pain of losing near and dear ones,” she mentioned. Laila Khatun, widow of police constable Hazrat Ali, became unconscious while delivering her statement before the premier. Ali was killed in an attack on a police outpost at Bamondanga in Gaibandha after an ICT verdict on Jamaat leader Delwar Hossain Sayedee. Van driver Ramzan Ali who lost his minor son Monir, police constable Pearul Islam who was burnt at a Hefazat rally, Helaluddin Pearu who was badly injured in a Jamaat-Shibir attack at Fatikchhari, lawyer Khodeza Nasrin, Gaibandha presiding officer Saidul Islam also narrated their traumas.
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