DHAKA, March 20, 2018 (BSS) – Civil society members, cultural personalities and politicians today said the attack on eminent writer and educationist Prof Zafar Iqbal was orchestrated to expose the nation to a state of brainlessness.
“The attack on Prof Zafar Iqbal was similar to the Pakistani occupational forces planned attack on the country’s intellectuals on December 14, 1971,” journalist and human right activist Shahriar Kabir told a mass-gathering at Central Shaheed Minar here.
“The attacks on Prof Zafar Iqbal and other free thinkers like Humayun Azad were not isolated incidents. Rather those were orchestrated attack on the country’s intelligentsia likewise the killings of intellectuals by listing their names during the country’s Liberation War,” he added.
The programme was organized in protest against the attack on Prof Zafar Iqbal with central 14-party alliance spokesman and Health and Family Welfare Minister Mohammed Nasim in the chair.
Shariar Kabir also demanded for imposing a ban on the religion based politics to make the country a non-communalism and secularism one in line with the country’s great Liberation War.
Nasim called for resisting militant and terrorist activities in the country as anti-liberation forces are out to create unrest ahead of the next general election.
“We have to uproot the communal forces from the society by any means to run the country with the spirit of Liberation War,” he said.
Nasim said a British lawyer, who has been vocal against the International Crimes Tribunal and extended support in favour of war criminals Mir Quasem Ali hanged for his crime against humanity, has been appointed to assist BNP chairperson Begum Khaleda Zia’s lawyers and to help in fighting her cases.
“It proves that BNP is still moving along with the anti-liberation forces,” he observed.
The 14-party spokesman also announced its next anti-militancy programmes as it would organise a public rally in Rangpur on March 30 and another one in Jessore on April 5.
Amir Hossain Amu said the BNP government had patronized militant and terrorist activities during their tenure from 2001-06 and while party’s founder Ziaur Rahman established war criminals and rewarded them by appointing war criminals as ambassadors in different countries.
Matia Chowdhury said the terrorists and militants in the country as well as all over the world are misguiding people in the name of religion.
No religion including Islam does not support killing of human beings, she said, adding that the extremist groups are brutally killing people in the name of protecting religion. “Such militant acts are nothing but crimes against humanity,” she observed.
Rashed Khan Menon said the attack on Prof Iqbal was not on a person rather it was on the spirit of Liberation War and freethinking people.
‘We must eliminate the communal anti-liberation forces from the country to run it with the spirit of Liberation War,” he added.
National University Vice-Chancellor Professor Harun-or-Rashid, Jagannath University Vice-Chancellor Professor Mizanur Rahman, Poet Professor Mohammad Samad, Hindu Bouddha Christian Oikyo Parishad activist Neem Chandra Bhowmik, Awami League organizing Secretary Khalid Mahmud Chowdhury, Tarikat Federation Chairman Mujibul Bashar Maizbhandari, NAP faction general secretary Nazrul Majid Belal and Ganatantri Party general secretary Shahadat Hossain, among others, spoke.