Desk Report, 13 December:

President M Abdul Hamid and Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina today paid profound respect and rich tributes to the best sons of the soil on the occasion of the Martyred Intellectuals Day.

In separate messages on the eve of the day, the President and the Prime Minister urged the people to come forward being imbued with the ideology of the martyred intellectuals to build a non-communal, happy and prosperous country.

President Abdul Hamid, in his message, said the intellectuals, as the conscience of the nation, had played a very significant role with their sharp writings and intellect-based spirit to create public opinion in favour of the Liberation War, provide suggestions to the war-time Mujibnagar government in advancing the war towards its successful end.

But it is unfortunate that the occupation forces and their local collaborators had brutally killed the country’s eminent intellectuals, including academicians, physicians, litterateurs, journalists and artists just on the eve of the victory, an irreparable loss to the nation, he added.  BSS

The President called upon all to be imbued with the ideology of the martyred intellectuals and build a non-communal society based on spirit of the Liberation War.

In her message, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina said at the fag end of the Liberation War, the Pakistani occupation forces, anti-liberation forces and their local collaborators had hatched conspiracies to turn the nation into a brain-empty state.

She said when the country was close to the final victory under the leadership of the greatest Bangalee of all times, Father of the Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, the intellectuals were killed by the occupation forces and their local cohorts like Al-Badars, Al-Shams and Razakars.

The premier said Professor Mofazzal Haidar Chowdhury, Munier Choudhury, Anwar Pasha, Shahidullah Kaisar, Gias Uddin, Dr Fazle Rabbi, Abdul Alim Chowdhury, Siraj Uddin Hossain, Selina Parveen, Dr Joytirmay Guha Thakurada were among those who were killed by the occupation forces and their collaborators.

Sheikh Hasina also said the anti-liberation forces assassinated Bangabandhu and most of his family members on August 15 in 1975.

They carried out repression and tortures on free thinkers, teachers, writers, journalists and politicians, she added.

The premier said the terrorist and militant groups also carried out a reign of terror in the country from 2001 to 2006. They also unleashed arson terrorism in the country to thwart the national election of January 5, 2014, and they are still hatching conspiracies.

“We have brought the killers of the martyred intellectuals under trial. No conspiracy can divert the nation from this process. Those who wanted to save the heinous war criminals will also be brought to justice one day,” she said.

She said the country and the nation will be freed from the stigma through implementation of all verdicts of war crime cases.

The prime minister called upon the people to be united against the conspiracies of the killers of 1971 and war criminals and Jammat-clique.