Home affairs adviser to the interim government retired Brigadier General M Sakhawat Hossain on Monday warned the Awami League for not attempting any ‘counter revolution’ as it would cost hundreds of lives.
‘If you [Sheikh Hasina] think that you will come through a counter revolution, you will have to shed blood of several thousand people. If you want to take the responsibility, you can do it,’ said Sakhawat while talking to reporters at Combined Military Hospital after visiting the injured Ansar members in the morning.
He said that no political party had created the movement but the country’s younger generation did it.
‘They [students] had sacrificed their lives that you [political leaders and activists] could not do. They had stood in front of the bullet with smiling face,’ the home adviser said, adding that the students would also face ousted prime minister Sheikh Hasina.
Having mentioned that people would not accept the Awami League at this moment, he advised the party to reorganise with leaders of good reputation as it had made immense contribution during the War of Independence under the leadership of the country’s founding president Sheikh Mujibur Rahman. Â
He requested Sheikh Hasina to let Bangladesh remain independent and not to hand it over to others for personal reason.
’Thirty lakh people sacrificed their lives for the independence of the country… You can do anything but do not hand over the country to others,’ Sakhawat said. He said that Awami League could do politics and would join the next elections as it was not banned.
Sakhawat Hossain was sworn in as the home affairs adviser to the interim government led by Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus on Thursday.
Sheikh Hasina, the longest serving prime minister in the country’s history, resigned and fled to India on August 5 amid a student-led mass uprising that left more than 376 people dead between July 16 and August 5, while many others, including police and members of other law enforcement agencies, were killed in retaliatory attacks in the aftermath of her ouster.