From Aug 15 to the Fifth Amendment – a painful saga in our history

Few tragedies in the history of political assassinations were as brutal and had such a profound impact in reversing the course of the history of a nation as the tragedy of Aug 15, 1975, when the founding father of Bangladesh was gunned down along with all of his family members present. When the murderers accomplished their mission just before the call for Fajr prayer, there laid a man who through his courage, charisma, and unprecedented sacrifice only a few years prior to this tragedy inspired a nation that was long colonised and almost forgotten to rise up, fight back and attain the dignity of freedom. The world knew him as a synonymous to the name of a nation, his people adored him and history loved him. When the killers left the residence, the address of which is inexplicably intertwined with the birth of a nation, it was completely silent, and no one left to wail.

What happened afterwards was mesmerising. The killing clique issued an Indemnity Ordinance, known as ordinance No. 50 of 1975, on Sept 26 the same year under the garb of martial law that they imposed. The ordinance dictated that those self-proclaimed assassins could not be prosecuted for their crime under any law of the land. Interestingly enough, martial law itself does not have any validity. Winston Churchill once said, "There is no law called martial law. If there is any, it is the law of jungle and can't be applied to a free people." Within a few months after the assassination of Bangabandhu, through palace intrigues, coups and bloody counter-coup d'états, the ultimate beneficiaries ascended to power.

Less than four years later, the beneficiaries of Bangabandhu's murder arranged a sham election under quasi martial law. That parliament did something that had no precedence in parliamentary history. The new parliament on Apr 9, 1979, made that Indemnity Ordinance a statute by making it a part of an amendment now notoriously known as the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution. As a matter of fact, the scope of the indemnity was vastly widened. Khandakar Mushtaque Ahmed, who directed the assassination of four national leaders in Dhaka Central Jail on the early hours of Nov 3, didn't have the chance to insert impunity of that brutal killing into the ordinance number 50. The first military dictator, General Ziaur Rahman did it all. He provided impunity to all the killings starting from Aug 15, 1975 to Apr 8, 1979, which included all the murders he committed to quashing 19 coup attempts that took place during his little over four years' tenure.

Since the time of 'Magna Carta,' the whole idea of a constitution is to ensure 'equal justice' and 'justice for all'. The inclusion of the Indemnity Ordinance into an amendment, in effect, nullified the constitutional process. But it did not end there. One of the key features of that amendment was to insert "Bismillahir Rahmanir Rahim (in the name of God – the Compassionate, Merciful)" into the preamble of the constitution to bemuse people and abuse religion. General Zia brought this fundamental change to the constitution by a proclamation on Apr 23, 1977.

Ibn Tayimmiah once was asked if Judaism, Christianity and Islam – each was to be defined in one phrase then what that would be. He said, Judaism is the "oneness of God", Christianity is "forgiveness to all" and Islam is to establish "justice on earth". In support of his argument, he quoted the famous verse from the Quran: " O ye who believe! Stand out firmly for justice, as witnesses to Allah, even as against yourselves, or your parents, or your kin, and whether it be (against) rich or poor: for Allah can best protect both. Follow not the lusts (of your hearts); lest ye swerve, and if ye distort (justice) or decline to do justice, verily Allah is well-acquainted with all that ye do". (Verse 4:135 Al Quran). He also mentioned the incident from Prophet Muhammad's (peace be upon him) life when he sent a group of young companions to Abyssinia to escape persecution in Makkah citing king in Abyssinia was a "just king". Thus, Ibn Tayimmiah concluded, "Justice is paramount in Islam". With the fifth amendment, that very first principle of God Almighty was violated in His Holy name. At the same time, it violated the most basic paradigm of the other two Abrahamic faiths. It was not only a crime against constitutional process or judicial process or political process, but it was also a crime against the ethos and ideals of our glorious liberation struggle in which 3 million perished to give us an identity. By violating God's fundamental principle set forth for believers and that too, in His Holy name, it was also a grievous sin.

The assassination of the Father of the Nation and the subsequent assassination of four national leaders paved the way to reverse our victory attained in 1971 through a blood-soaked war of liberation.

The instrument of surrender had these lines included: "This surrender includes all PAKISTAN land, air and naval forces as also all para-military forces and civil armed forces." The dreaded Razakar, Al Badr and Al-Shams forces fall into this category. Four political parties whose ranks and files engaged in a rampant orgy of murder and mayhem by siding with genocidal Pakistani occupation forces were banned on Dec 22, 1971. Bangabandhu's administration began the trial of the war criminals in 1973 under the Bangladesh Collaborators (Special Tribunals) Order 1972 which was a part of the historic 1972 constitution. But post-Aug 15 military regimes scrapped Bangladesh Collaborators Act by issuing the marital law ordinance No. 63 of 1975 on Dec 31 the same year paving the way to release more than 11,000 war criminals under trial. On May 3, 1976, second proclamation rescinded Article 38 of the constitution that prohibited religious parties, thus ending "secularism" in effect allowing banned four ideologically pro-Pakistani parties to enter into political space in sovereign Bangladesh. The same second proclamation also scrapped Article 122 of the constitution which prohibited voter rights of the convicted war criminals. Thus ideals of the victors and the ideologies of the defeated were given the same space in politics in the name of "national unity" and moreover, the latter group was systematically rehabilitated in the society and was patronised into the economy by the then regime. Soon after this episode, the members of these parties known to the general mass as "Razakars" decorated the corridors of power. Bangladesh became the only country in the world which had two opposing ideologies from two states, one victorious the other vanquished, existing side by side in one land. Our hard-fought victory on Dec 16, 1971, was thrown into a quagmire of confusion to subsequent generations, if not completely reversed. Ever since Bangladesh has been divided into pro- and anti-liberation forces. No nation had the unfortunate fate of reversal of glory within a short span of a spectacular victory. It had been only possible through the assassination of Bangabandhu, the very symbol of freedom and dignity of a perpetually humiliated and insulted nation.

By amending articles 8,9,10 and 12 of the 1972 constitution two of the pillars of constitution namely secularism and socialism were completely abolished beyond recognition.

It took 21 long agonising years for the daughters of Bangabandhu to lead a struggle against military and quasi-military regimes to restore democracy in Bangladesh by winning a historic election in 1996 and thus set the process in motion to repel that black and unholy indemnity ordinance. During that span of two decades, few generations grew up confused about their glorious past that in effect made them devoid of rationale to engage in any sort of intellectual discourse with truth, logic and facts. The legacy of the assassination of Bangabandhu was not just to grab power but to reverse our victory and divide our nation. It also marked an era when a great religion was politicised to achieve and sustain narrow political goals and to destroy socio-religious harmony. Our nation continues to pay a heavy price from that painful saga.