The Fire of July: Fall of a 16-year Dictatorship
I was in RS-66 when the ‘July revolution’ started. On July 15th, 2024, we went home for a mid vacation for 5 days, that turned into 45 days almost. How this happened is a long, tragic and a terrifying story.
Since early July, tensions had been rising between the students and the then Awami League(AL)-led government . The students were demanding rational reform of the quota system through peaceful processions that later came to the streets as ‘peaceful quota movement’. During the movement the prime minister provoked the students by addressing them as “Rajakar”, ignoring the logical demands and lawful rights of the citizens of a democratic country.
On 15th and 16th July, members of BSL shot at the students’ rally. Whereas the quota- related issues could have been solved with a peaceful conference, she apparently chose violence. Halls of Dhaka and Jahangirnagar universities were vacated in mid-night of 15 July. Bullets, tear gas were shot, the students were forced and dragged out of their halls. That was a reflection of the infamous “black night of 25th March 1971”. After vacating the halls, the authorities thought the protest had been over. But they had no clue what was waiting for them in the next few days. The private university students took the streets and that led to the end of their dirty power games.
On 18th July, students from private universities gathered at the Badda-Aftabnagar area. As the students stood in front of Brac University, police started firing rubber bullets, tear gas; it became all chaotic. Soon students from EWU, UIU, NSU, AIUB etc. came forward. They surrounded the police and cornered them into a building near BracU’s campus. Many students were injured on that day. A student from Memorial College was shot to death by the police. We tried to take him to the hospital but the police did not let the ambulance go out of the campus. If I call this a murder, will I be wrong? I don’t think so. This movement of the private university students was never under the count of the government, they never thought private university students would rage up like this. The dictators-men were terrified, they were scared. They predicted they might lose their power.
Meanwhile the students tried continuously to contact the foreign media tirelessly but the government took a very wrong decision by turning off the internet around 5 p.m on the 18th. The days afterwards were frightening. RAB helicopters patrolled all day with open doors and loaded guns, sounds of bullets echoing throughout the day, the smell of teargas tingling across the room. We were in the dark about what’s happening, after 5 days they resumed the internet and we got to know how many people were shot to death, there were piles of dead bodies, from innocent children to elders. There were massive arrests going all around the country. Then this protest was not limited to the quota movement anymore, it turned into a revolutionary protest, protest for stepping down Sheikh Hasina- a notorious dictator.
The days from 25th July to 5th of August were beyond expression, full of thrilling news and experiences. Only one slogan “step down Hasina” was echoed from every corner of the country. People from all around the country gathered together in Dhaka on 5th August to participate in the ‘Long March to Dhaka’. That was literally a huge gathering of mass people. With the loss of more than a thousand lives and the curse from millions, Hasina finally stepped down and fled. People won, 16 years of dictatorship ended. People started dreaming of independence again after 16 years, they embraced the breeze of independence once again.
