Bangladesh Chief Adviser Mohammad Yunus’ Press Secretary Shafiqul Alam applied pressure on a senior journalist of Dhaka-based Aajkar Patrika newspaper to remove an article headlined ‘History’s multi-instanced month of August’ (‘Itihaser ghatanabahul August maas’), which appeared on August 14, from the Bengali daily’s online edition.
Multiple sources confirmed today that Alam called up the Aajker Patrika senior journalist who eventually succumbed to the pressures and threats from the Press Secretary.
A BBC report today said that the Press Secretary’s office refrained from commenting on the issue of senior journalist Bibhuranjan Sarkar’s death and the circumstances surrounding it.
Repeated phone calls by Northeast News to Alam did not elicit any response.
Media circles in Dhaka confirmed to Northeast News that since taking over as Press Secretary on August 14, 2024, Alam has applied pressure on several newspaper and media outlets to appoint journalists of his choice.
Sarkar’s body was found in the Meghna River at Kalagachha union in Narayanganj on August 22, a day after he left his Siddeshwari home near Baily Road in Dhaka.
Sarkar, 71, was a senior Joint Editor at Aajker Patrika. An ‘open letter’ authored by him appeared on bdnews24.com early on August 22 morning. It reflected his extreme frustration over several issues, including his financial station.
In the ‘open letter’ Sarkar bemoaned the state of affairs in Bangladesh, the loss of press freedom, his dire financial circumstances and other bitter experiences.
He also referred to the article authored by Dhaka-based senior journalist and columnist Mazharul Islam Babla that appeared in Aajker Patrika’s print edition and online on August 14.
This article pointed out pointing out that newspaper editors “constantly fear phone calls (from unnamed government quarters) to not carry certain kinds of stories and articles”.
Defending Mazharul Islam Babla’s article, Sarkar admitted that he was not on speaking terms with Aajker Patrika’s editor.
Babla’s article focused on the radical shift in Bangladesh’s politics towards the far right and a distinct “Pakistanisation” since August 2024 when the Mohammad Yunus-led interim regime took charge after Sheikh Hasina fled Dhaka.
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He recalled in his article how much of Bangladesh would follow the dictates of the Pakistani authorities who would treat India as an “enemy country”, especially after the 1965 war.
“On August 14 (Pakistan’s independence day), we had to raise the Pakistani flag on our rooftops and offer munajat (appeal or supplication),” the articles noted towards the beginning.
But it also drew attention to the August 21, 2004, grenade attack on an Awami League rally in which Sheikh Hasina had escaped narrowly with her life.
The article telling revealed how, during the violent July-August 2024 students’ movement, people died as a consequence of firing by not only the police but also “armed terrorists” who were part of a “meticulous design”.
