Editorial
Attack at a Baishakhi fair
Another act of cultural subversion
THE cocktail blasts at Baishakhi mela (fair) at the remote Atrai upazila in Naogaon district that hurt 10 including children is an ominous reminder of how vulnerable our national cultural symbols, especially the events that mark them, are from detractors' wrath. So intense was the terrorists' hatred towards our culture that even children who went to enjoy the yearly event were not spared.
We have no words to condemn the perpetrators of the heinous act of violence. The law-enforcers must ferret out the terrorists responsible for the dastardly act and mete out exemplary punishment to them.
We may recall the horrors that visited the Udichi's cultural event at Jessore on the night of March 7 in 1999 and the Ramna bBotomul Baishakhi fair in 2001. There are still other instances of violence at cultural events of similar nature at different places in the past. Some of those incidents took their bloody tolls.
Unfortunately, the perpetrators, in most cases, could successfully escape the noose of the law. Even those behind deadly bomb explosions at Udichi event in Jessore and the Ramna Botomul Baishakhi mela could not be identified, far less brought to justice, after the lapse of so many years.
The fallout of the police's failure to apprehend and punish the terrorists has been that those who are targeting the symbols of Bengali culture and heritage are getting bolder by the day.
The attack at the Atrai Baishakhi mela is a pointer to the fact that the enemies of Bengali culture are on the prowl and would hit its symbols whenever and wherever they find any lapse in the security arrangements surrounding the events.
In this context, we have to say that while the Baishakhi mela in Dhaka was held under tight security that of Atrai fell prey to a heinous attack, thanks to insufficient security arrangements.
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