Verdict in Ramna blast case

WITH the verdict pronounced by a Dhaka court on Monday, the nation has finally been  able to set the course of justice in the deadly Ramna Batamul blast case. Of the 14 accused of perpetrating the savage attack on a Chhayanaut programme on Bangla New Year's Day in 2001 that killed 10 people and injured scores of others, eight have been handed death penalty, while six others will serve life imprisonment.
The culprits behind the Ramna blast deserve the punishment as awarded by the court  simply because they had not just killed and injured some individuals by their sinister act.  Actually, their target was the  very cultural moorings and ethos  on which the nation and the state of Bangladesh stand. In that sense, the magnitude of their crime outweighs the punishment they received.
The near and dear ones of the victims of the Ramna blast, we hope, will find solace in the fact that the perpetrators have been brought to justice. .The waiting time from 2001 to 2014 is undoubtedly a long one for them to see justice.  Despite the delay, it has been a landmark verdict that has struck hard at the psyche of impunity. Hopefully, it will strike fear in hearts of terrorists who might be waiting in the wings to commit similar heinous crime in the future.
The imperative is to get to the root of the problem and duly address it at its source to eradicate the politics of hatred and forces of obscurantism in society.