Brigadier General (retd) M Sakhawat Hossain, former Home Affairs Adviser (currently Jute and Textile Adviser) of the Interim Government has said that 1,000 people have been killed in the recent agitation in Bangladesh over the demand for quota reform.
He gave this information in an interview given to the Indian media Northeast News on Friday (August 16).
In a 45-minute phone interview, he said, “In some parts of Dhaka and in other districts, the then Sheikh Hasina’s police forces fired or attacked crowds, mostly students and youth, with lethal weapons.”
Senior police officials spoke to Northeast News on August 15. They said, ‘The Ministry of Home Affairs of Bangladesh has focused first on central and district level leaders of Awami League, who are suspected to have fled to India and other countries.’
M Sakhawat Hossain, who spoke to numerous police officers after assuming the duties of the Home Affairs Advisor of the interim government, said, ‘I had to talk to the policemen for five hours to calm them down. I wanted to know who they killed and who in the Sheikh Hasina government ordered them to do so. Hearing this, many policemen burst into tears. Some of them even hugged me as part of their remorse and guilt for these murders.’
Nobel laureate Dr. M Sakhawat Hossain said, “My message to the Indian government is, do you want to see a friendly or hostile government in Dhaka?” A country that wants to become a superpower should not interfere in the internal affairs of a neighboring country like Bangladesh. We are not a ragtag gang.’