Writer-blogger Avijit’s murder at secured area leaves police ‘stupefied’

Even police are ‘stupefied’ at the murder of writer-blogger Avijit Roy in a highly secured area, where a similar terrorist attack on another freethinker Professor Humayun Azad had taken place. 

Shameema Binte Rahman and Golam Mujtaba Dhrubabdnews24.com
Published : 27 Feb 2015, 03:02 PM
Updated : 5 April 2015, 05:47 PM

Avijit was hacked to death in the busy hours of Thursday night a few hundred yards away from the Amar Ekushey Book Fair and the Shahbagh Police Station in the Dhaka University area.
 
The US-based Bangladeshi expatriate had spent his childhood there.
 
His father Ajay Roy, a professor of the university’s physics department, has blamed the extremist militants for the murder.
 
Police are also pointing finger at the extremists, but failed to say clearly how the extremists were carrying out such attacks repeatedly without being noticed by the law enforcers.
 
Dhaka Metropolitan Police’s (DMP) Commissioner Asaduzzaman Mia told bdnews24.com on Friday that the militants proved how desperate they could be.
 
“It occurred just near the police station! Police were at all the gates of the book fair...they (extremists) attacked even after that (deployment)!”
 
Avijit, the founder of blog Mukto-Mona (Free-mind), and his wife and fellow blogger Rafida Ahmed Bonya were brutally hacked on the footpath adjacent to the Suhrawardy Udyan on the other side of Milan Chattor around 9:30pm.
 
The writer died at the Dhaka Medical College and Hospital later. His seriously injured wife is undergoing treatment at the Square Hospital.

Since his arrival in Dhaka on Feb 16, Avijit had been visiting the book fair every day. Thousands of people take the street, where Avijit was hacked, to go to the fair.

Teachers and students of the university, cultural activists and thousands of others also use the street in the cultural hub of Dhaka every day.

The site of the murder is only 25 yards away from the Teacher-Student Centre (TSC) of the university and the gate of the Suhrawardy Udyan. Police have been guarding the TSC intersection by setting up barricades throughout the month for the book fair.

The Shahbagh Police Station is barely 200 yards from the murder scene. Police have also been deployed at Doel Chattor, Fuller Road intersection, Nilkhet and every other significant spot of the campus to secure the book fair.

But Shahbagh police OC Sirajul Islam could not answer how the attackers could flee the area and why they had failed to arrest anyone over the murder.

He said a group titled “Ansar Bangla 7” claimed responsibility for the murder, saying it was a “victory” in a Twitter post.

“We are investigating the matter. Initially it seems that militants have carried out the attack,” he added.

Quoting flower vendor ‘Selim’, a witness, the OC said two men aged between 30 and 35 carried out the attack. One of them wore white shirt and the other a coat.
 
“They took one to two minutes. It was a very swift attack. When Selim shouted, they chased him. He ran away to save his own life,” the OC said.
 
Witnesses to the attack said they saw the attackers running away in two different directions - one towards the Suhrawardy Udyan and the other towards the Milan Chattar.

The doctor who autopsied Avijit’s body said his head was struck thrice ‘very expertly in a brutal manner’ with sharp weapons. The assailant knew where to strike to kill, he added.
 
The area from the Shahbagh intersection to the book fair at the Bangla Academy premises, with the National Museum, Public Library, Fine Arts Faculty, Chhabir Haat, Suhrawardy Udyan, Arts Faculty and TSC between them, is the cultural hub of the people.

Freethinkers, writers, cultural activists, teachers, students and many others gather there every day, especially during the book fair, to talk issues of interest over tea.

On Feb 27, 2004 writer Humayun Azad was also hacked only a few hundred yards away from the TSC. Police have found involvement of the militants in that incident.

On Thursday, a day before the anniversary of the brutal attack on Humayun Azad during the book fair, Avijit was attacked.

He had been threatened several times for writing against communalism and religious radicalism.

The murder has raised question about police’s role, sparking concerns among the publishers, writers, readers and cultural activists.

Writer and journalist Shahriar Kabir, a friend of Avijit’s father Professor Ajay Roy, expressed his anger at the gruesome murder.

“Is any citizen safe in any place of the country? Humayun Azad was hacked in these very premises of the book fair. 

“We, the writers and artists, cannot move safely after that attack. How can we live in such a place under the threat of getting ourselves killed?” he asked.

“Please tell me why I can’t go to the book fair. Why Mamun (historian Muntasir Mamun) goes to the book fair surrounded by his students?”

He recalled that the radicals declared Avijit’s father Ajay Roy, who taught physics at Dhaka University, an atheist-apostate in 2013. “They also threatened Avijit several times.”

The acting chief of Ekattorer Ghatak Dalal Nirmul Committee also said he thought the law enforcers could have traced the killers easily if they kept an eye on the social media.

Owner of Shrabon Publisher Robin Ahsan commented that Avijit’s murder was a result of the failure to punish the murderers of Humayun Azad 10 years on.

Shahbagh police OC Sirajul Islam, however, was not ready to admit that police failed to ensure people’s safety.

“Police always try their best. They always want that no unpleasant incident takes place,” he said.

Commissioner Asaduzzaman also denied police failure. But it was clear from his remarks that they were stunned at the murder of Avijit that apparently took place before the law enforcers.

He said the attacks on Humayun Azad, blogger Ahmed Rajib Haider at Mirpur and on Avijit were linked.

He also indicated that the Dhaka University campus might have become a stronghold of the militants.

“Those who came with knives were not outsiders. They thrived around the university,” he commented.

[Additional reporting by Liton Haider and Kamal Talukder]