‘Save my husband’s life’, pleads prof M Anwar Hossain’s wife

Ayesha Hossain, wife of professor M Anwar Hossain, a retired UGC Professor of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at Dhaka University and former vice chancellor of Jahangirnagar University, sought help from interim government to save her husband’s life who was brutally attacked allegedly by several right-wing fanatics in front of the Hazrat Shahjalal Airport in Dhaka on Monday just around 4pm.

In a statement, Ayesha Hossain hoped that the newly formed interim government led by Nobel laureate Prof Dr Muhammad Yunus will take immediate steps to protect her husband and family from further attacks.

The student coordinators of the quota reform movement, the Bangladesh Army and most importantly, the interim government must ensure the safety, security and human rights of all who have been attacked and remain at risk of suffering irreparable harm, she said.

In the statement she also recalled the deadly attacks. She wrote: “It is well-known and widely documented that in recent weeks, Professor Hossain was highly critical of the recently deposed government’s indiscriminate attacks on students who organised the quota reform movement, attacks which led to the loss of hundreds of innocent lives.

“On Monday afternoon, my husband, son, daughter-in-law and I left our home on two battery-driven rickshaws around 3:30pm. The main road approaching the airport from Uttara was packed with hundreds and thousands of people.

“On approaching the airport, we realised it would no longer be possible to continue moving ahead on the rickshaws. We got down and began to walk along with the people on the road. When we arrived exactly in front of the airport, an unknown person who appeared to be in his early 40s suddenly approached my husband and began to shout:

“I recognise you. You’re the professor who was against Jamaat [Jamaat-e-Islami] at the Tribunal [International Crimes Tribunal]. We saw you on the television.

“The same person tried to forcefully take my husband down a narrow lane opposite the airport. My family members and I strongly resisted this. Almost instantly, several more agitated people [three to four] gathered around my husband. They started chanting ‘Naara-e-Takbeer’. One of them said, ‘You spoke against Jamaat. We’re going to slit your throat.’ The agitated individuals unleashed a vicious attack on my husband with various objects. One of them said: ‘Hit him on his head. Kill him.’

“My daughter-in-law rushed to several uniformed army personnel standing about ten feet away on a military jeep to seek help. One of them told her he would see what could be done, but almost out of fear, none got down from the jeep.

“The deadly attacks went on for several minutes, during which my son, my daughter-in-law and I used our own bodies to shield my husband, especially his head. In the process, we were injured during the attack,” according to the statement.

“The white shirt my husband wore was drenched in blood. I realised that my husband was on the brink of death, and our desperate attempts to save him were failing. We instinctively felt that we would have to drag my husband away from the clutches of the attackers and take him towards an Army barricade in front of the entrance of the Airport. At this moment, two unknown civilians appeared out of nowhere to our aid. One of them was a tall, dark man wearing a black t-shirt. I can’t recall the appearance of the second person. They joined us in shielding my husband’s body. The man wearing the black T-shirt kept shouting: ‘What are you doing?! He is a human being! He is a human being!’

“The attacks continued. I don’t know how, but we miraculously dragged my husband across the Airport Road towards the Army barricade. Once we reached the barricade, I could see that the army personnel were in a clear state of shock seeing my husband’s bloodied body. They quickly recovered from the initial shock when we told them who my husband was. They took my husband and my family members onto their side of the barricade. With the support of Air Force personnel and members of the Airport’s security detail [one of whom told me that he was a former student of Jahangirnagar University], we entered the Airport. My husband received immediate treatment at the medical centre beside the departure lounge.

“My son was with him during this time. My daughter-in-law and I waited in a prayer room in the arrivals lounge. In the evening, after spending several hours at the Airport, we left the premises through its VIP exit. We got on to a rickshaw van in front of the Biman Airlines Training Center and left for safer locations,” the statement added.

“As Bangladesh has been plunged into extreme levels of lawlessness and anarchy in the absence of a government, there are compelling reasons to believe many vested quarters took advantage of the situation, and this includes far-right militant extremists.

“They have unleashed indiscriminate, ruthless and targeted attacks across the country on our religious minorities, individuals and families [such as my husband] known for their uncompromising stand against religious extremism and war criminals, innocent members of the Awami League and many symbols of our Liberation War.

“Hundreds and thousands of common students who led the quota-reform movement sparked a mass uprising at an unprecedented scale and have now pledged to build a humane Bangladesh without discrimination and built on the principles of equity and equality and overarchingly a welfare state.

“Too many people have sacrificed their lives in recent weeks to realise their noble dream. We cannot allow this dream to go in vain. We demand justice for all,” reads the statement.