Where Truth Was Beaten

In Gopalganj, on a suffocating July afternoon, the air grew thick not just with humidity but with the unmistakable scent of impending violence. Beneath the surface of political slogans and gathering crowds ran a deeper current, an existential anxiety that plagues every society trying to emerge from the shadows of tyranny. The philosopher Walter Benjamin once said, “Even the dead will not be safe from the enemy if he wins.”

And on this day, the ghosts of past oppression stirred again. What we saw in Gopalganj was not just violence against the living but a symbolic desecration of collective memory—a deliberate act meant to remind us that historical trauma, when unacknowledged, festers into fresh cruelty. As the crowd gathered, their hearts carried the weight of history—of battles fought, wounds unhealed, dreams repeatedly betrayed. They came not with weapons, but with conviction.

Psychologically, this conviction was rooted in what Erich Fromm once called the ‘courage to be’— the defiant stand of individuals asserting their agency even when threatened by structures built to silence them.

These were young people who had already defied fear once in 2024. Now they returned, believing perhaps that power had learned its lesson. They believed that suffering had earned them the right to speak freely. They were wrong; but not because their ideals were flawed. They were wrong because the psychology of authoritarianism, once entrenched, does not retreat willingly. It must be dislodged. They came not to conquer, but to remember. And in response, they were met with brutality.

16 July 2025, was not merely a date. It was a test of whether memory could stand its ground in the face of terror. It was a reckoning between two visions of the nation: one rooted in fear and force and the other in dignity and democratic dissent. Those who marched did not come to threaten; they came to honour. But their presence alone was deemed offensive by those who could not tolerate the truth.

This was not a riot. It was a coordinated performance of intimidation— an authoritarian theatre aimed at reinstating fear where courage had begun to bloom. The victims were not rebels or rioters, but citizens exercising their democratic rights. The perpetrators were not anonymous mobs, but familiar actors from a political machinery once dethroned yet never defanged.

This was a declaration, shouted in blood and smoke, that the supremacist instincts of a dethroned regime still pulse with vengeance and that a party unseated by the moral will of the people refuses to concede even symbolic space. It was an attack not just on those present in Gopalganj, but on all who dare believe that this country belongs to its people, not to a supreme, power-obsessed political party that thrived on fear.

On that day, members of the National Citizen Party (NCP), mostly young people inspired by the victorious July 2024 uprising, gathered peacefully in Gopalganj. Their goal was to honour those who made sacrifices for freedom and demand was that no more blood be spilled in the name of power. But instead of being protected by law enforcement, they were ambushed by Awami League cadres armed with rods, sticks, bombs, and a deep, seething hatred. They attacked civilians, destroyed public property, disrupted a lawful gathering and transformed an act of remembrance into a blood-stained warning. Let there be no confusion: this was not a clash; it was an attack. It was not chaos; it was a strategy.

Even though the Awami League was forcefully removed by the people’s uprising in 2024, it has never accepted defeat. It lurks like a wounded beast, bitter and unrepentant. The violence in Gopalganj was not spontaneous. It was premeditated. It was advertised in advance on social media. And it was allowed to happen because the institutions that should have prevented it still cower before the remnants of a regime that believed itself above the law. What happened in Gopalganj is a case study in how fascist tendencies survive transitions of power. Without accountability and without justice, the same violent actors will return, more emboldened, more vicious. What the Awami League did was not just an attack on the NCP. It was an attack on the very idea that power can be challenged. It was meant to punish memory itself.

The Awami League treats Gopalganj not as a district, but as sacred territory— a delusional fortress where it believes no one else has the right to speak, to gather or to dream differently. That belief is not only irrational— it is dangerous. When the NCP tried to organize a peaceful programme there, AL thugs saw it as a threat to their fantasy of permanent rule. So, they responded with the only language they seem to understand: violence. These acts are not about defending heritage or ideology. They are about silencing dissent through fear. And the most frightening part? There was no apology. No accountability. No shame. Just silence.

In a democratic society, journalists are the eyes of the people. In Gopalganj, those eyes were targeted too. Reporters from different TV channels and newspapers were beaten. Media vans were attacked. The message was clear: those who tell the truth must be punished. But history teaches us—again and again—that truth is stubborn. The more you try to bury it, the deeper it roots itself. The Online Editors’ Alliance was right to call this a heinous crime. But words alone will not be enough. There must be justice. There must be action. The lives shattered in Gopalganj cannot be healed with press releases. They demand real consequences.

And here is the bitter truth: the Awami League dares to repeat its crimes because it was never punished for the July 2024 massacre. Gopalganj is not a new wound. It is the reopening of an old one that was never allowed to heal. In the face of this, we must remember that hope is not naive—it is necessary. As Mahmudur Rahman, editor and publisher of Daily Amar Desh, said, “We must stop reading Spartacus or Che. Let us learn instead from the July martyrs—Abu Sayeed, Mughdho, Nafiz—whose names now form the canon of a new resistance.” This is our fight now. Not just against a party but against a mentality, a culture of impunity and a regime of fear. It must be named, confronted and dismantled before it takes everything from us again.
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The writer is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Philosophy at IUBAT and pursuing a Master’s in Human Rights and Multiculturalism at University of South Eastern Norway