Several senior police officers seen as aligned with the Awami League have fled the country, taken shelter abroad and are trying in various ways to turn the police force against the government, according to people concerned. They say Monirul Islam, a former chief of the Special Branch (SB) and a dismissed additional inspector general of police, is using the killing of police during the July uprising to create disorder within the force.
Speaking from abroad recently, Monirul Islam claimed that the Bangladesh police had been taken away from its professional duty and set against a political party. Those who criticise him say he passed over the killing of some 1,500 students and members of the public and the maiming of several thousand protesters in the uprising, and has spread confusion among the public. He claimed that a political party supported by a large part of the population cannot be held back by bans or police force alone.
Joining a talk show, he claimed that anger and fear are at work among lower-ranking officers because none of the killings in the violence of 2024 has been properly investigated and because some police stations and installations were burned down. He said that while the police are giving 90% of their attention to flash processions and detaining political leaders and activists, the country’s crime control and counter-intelligence against militancy are weakening.
People concerned think such statements incite Awami League-aligned officers in the police and give some encouragement to the party’s leaders and activists. They say such provocative talk risks creating disorder in the force and is having a negative effect on its work.
According to the sources, leaders and activists of the ousted Awami League are trying in various ways to make their presence known through flash processions and rallies and greater activity online. In districts along the border and at several spots in Dhaka in particular, they have adopted the tactic of suddenly parading with a banner for a few minutes and spreading the footage on social media to put psychological pressure on the police. Recent flash processions in Gulshan, Uttara, Pirojpur, Noakhali, Chattogram, Gazipur, Barishal, Bagerhat and Netrokona have worried law enforcers. They have also caused some alarm among police in the field, because the top level of the force has announced that the superintendent of police, the deputy commissioner and the officer-in-charge will be held responsible for any flash procession in their area. That is already being put into practice.
According to intelligence agencies, a secret plan is being made to create instability in the field around an announcement that the Awami League president, the ousted Sheikh Hasina, who has fled the country, will return in December. Attempts are being made to fund some inactive members of the party’s affiliates, particularly the Jubo League and the banned Chhatra League, to take part. The agencies say a number of Awami League-aligned officers within the police are complicit. They name the recently withdrawn officer-in-charge of Cantonment police station, Rakibul Hasan, as one, and say others like him are still privately voicing hope of the former rulers’ return.
Intelligence sources say that besides spreading audio clips and instructions from Sheikh Hasina on social media, attempts are being made through various Telegram channels to stir discontent among ordinary people by highlighting the government’s economic or law and order difficulties. In place of visible programmes the party has adopted a strategy of keeping its base alive by staying in touch with grassroots activists in small groups or online.
Security analysts say it is taking time to recover from the destructive state in which the Awami League government left the police after using the force as a political weapon. Since 5 August 2024 there has been a major challenge in rebuilding discipline and morale within the police. The deaths of a number of police personnel in clashes during the movement caused anger and fear in a section of the force, and the analysts say the Awami League’s policymakers, their associates in the police and fugitive former officers want to exploit that. They say that whatever the anger, a professional police force can never be party to the return of such a force.
Former inspector general of police Abdul Quayum said the police are a disciplined force whose main work is to carry out their professional duty and maintain law and order, without political bias. He said there had been extensive partisanship in the police in the past: recruitment was not transparent, party people were given opportunities through irregularities and syndicates were built up. As the Awami League’s political activities are banned or suspended by government order, he said, it is the duty of law enforcers not to allow them and to prevent them firmly. No police officer should work to a political agenda; such conduct damages the dignity of the force and the order of the country, and proper action should be taken against those who do so.
বাংলায় মূল প্রতিবেদন পড়ুন · Read the original Bengali report