My fellow humans, (It may be a theist, atheist, agonist, deist, freethinkers, conservatives or any other person who have even the minimum level of humanity left inside)
I am Fozol Korim Ovi, an intern vet, from Bangladesh.
A supposedly secular country which is currently occupied by religious fanaticism. I know it is hard for modern civilized world to digest the fact that, even in this era people are killed in some distance corner of this planet for simply not believing in religious absurdity, for revealing truth against the holy lies. Peoples are killed for their speech, for their writings. Well compiled reasoning is replied by machetes. And it’s all truly happening to my locality.
In my country, “Freedom of speech” is just an illusion. You can’t speak against the religion, more specifically against Islam. It’s a death wish. You might be killed on spot. You can’t speak about human rights, Feminism, homosexuality, evolution or any other things that contradict with religion. You have to compromise with highly conservative society if you want them to spare your life. And first step to that is keeping your mouth shut. Otherwise you might be attacked like Professor Humayun Azad ( who later died of his wounds) or be exiled like Taslima Nasrin.
By the wake of information technology the captive peoples of Bangladesh found a platform to express themselves. They started to share their thoughts, feelings and ideals in cyber platforms like blogs, facebook, twitter and other social media. First it appeared lot safer than the public places. But soon the bigots started to infiltrate the cyber space.
It all started in February 2013 when Razib Hayder who used to write by the fake name “Thaba Baba” was brutally murdered for writing satire against the religious fallacy in his blog. The tragedy is followed by four more assassination of online activists namely Washikur Babu, Avijit Roy, Ananta Bijoy Das, And Niladry Chattapaddhay. Their only offense was they used to write against the religion.
Speaking of those murders, the fourth one, Ananta Bijoy Das was killed front of my very eyes. I saw those 4 thugs chased him to a gully where they hacked him to death. Ironically the cops couldn’t capture them due to lack of evidence and eye witness. When I contacted to a local police station to volunteer as a witness first they rebuked me and then advised not to risk my own life for one who is already gone. I may not give a perfect description of those assailants (as all of them were masked) but I can surely describe their stature. Especially about the fourth one who was bulkier than the others and had an awkwardly distinct locomotion. I repeatedly told those cops over phone that I can tell the fourth one by simply watching him running, but they wasn’t even interested to know how!
The 5th and the latest murder were even more dramatic. Few months before the incident took place Niladry Chattapaddhay went to police station seeking protection as he was threatened through internet. Instead of providing protection cops simply advised him to leave the country to somewhere else! And at the D day, assassins infiltrated into his residence proving that the atheist are not safe, even in their own home and there’s no one to save their ass. You oppose the religion and you have to die. It’s that simple.
Despite the increasing number of fatality, so called secular government barely took any action to bring those terrorists to justice. Instead the IGP of police brought IT low article 57 into play. This article says,
“If anybody willingly post false, obscene posts or any content reading of which may seduces or influence someone to amiss religious morality, or that is pejorative to someone, or derogatory to the image of the state or of any VIP person, or hurts someone’s religious feelings, or instigate insurgence against the state or any of its organization then it can be considered as a crime. The punishment of this crime is 7 to 14 years of incarceration with or without fines.”
According to this article if I forget to write “Bismillah/Hallelujah” at the beginning of my publication and it hurts someone’s religious feeling, I would be sentenced to 7-14 years imprisonment and it might be associated with heavy fine!
The Muslim majority of this country openly supports these murders and any attempt of the government to capture the murderers will severely irate them. From the past experience of Hapazath movement, where the Muslim majority went berserk against the women equality policy and swarm across the street in demand of Blasphemy law, the government is well aware of the outcome of exasperating those fanatic Muslims. So instead of capturing those terrorists to stop this madness, government simply tries to enforce the article 57, limiting the freedom of speech and destroying the only mean to make a stand against the religious fallacy. This is how they want to solve the crisis. Stop the writings of free thinkers, incarcerate them for their articles, and thus prevent the murders and simultaneously appease the religious majority and also secure the vote bank.
In this part of the world we are persecuted by both, the government and the bigot terrorists. You either get killed or be in prison. This is the choice we are left with.
As a Bangladeshi atheist, I request every single human being who believes in freedom of speech to rise against this inhumanity. We, the Bangladeshis may not be your brothers/sisters, we may have different nationality, we may differ in our separate perspective, but after all we are human. And as a human we can expect support from other humans at our rainy day. This was the reason why we became a gregarious species. To supports each other. To save each other’s ass.
So here I urge you to be united and protest against this inhumanity. Protest front of Bangladesh embassy in your own country. Make it an international movement. As the negligible minority (thanks to insidious religious indoctrination) our protestation doesn’t hold any significance. But I believe if global protest breaks out, under intense international pressure our government can’t but change their policy and capture those terrorists, which will bring an end to these fatalities and conserve freedom of speech.
I don’t believe in God but that doesn’t make me a nonbeliever. I still believe in human, and I believe together we can.
I know what I asked for is really hard to achieve. After 8 hours intense working, at the end of the day peoples hardly have any time and stamina left to protest for others whom the barely met. Even if they do, we still have to organize that movement and have to reach out for various international authorities which will take lots of time and affords. But it doesn’t mean we have to wait forever to start a revolution. It can’t be too late to save a fallen soul. So I raised a small step today. I took a “red taped selfi” signifying the scarcity of human rights and freedom of speech in Bangladesh.
Here I arrange a “RED TAPED SELFI CONTEST” and wish peoples all over the world will participate to uphold the freedom of speech and start protesting for the safety of Bangladeshi online activists.
Thank you for being with us.
Sincerely
Ovi.
Event link: Red Taped Selfi Contest
https://www.facebook.com/events/1055384161162937/Page link: Red Taped Selfi Contest
https://www.facebook.com/RedTapedSelfieContest 
Topic: #Bangladesh, Red taped Selfi contest