Co-Author SM Faiyaz Hossain

Under the current interim regime, extrajudicial violence has not merely been tolerated; it has been routinized.

Once lionized as the “banker to the poor,” Mohammad Yunus the microcredit mythologist now presides—directly or symbolically—over a Bangladesh in slow-motion disintegration. Over the past fourteen months, the mounting crises—economic, legal, social and political—no longer speak of mere instability; they shout systemic collapse and kleptocracy. Yunus’s promise of reform now rings hollow amid daily horrors.

The promise reflects his longstanding fictitious tales of donor friendly rhetoric and fundraising manuals pertaining to three zeros; and sending poverty to museums. 

Economic Stagnation and Social Collapse

Bangladesh’s long-praised growth trajectory has lost traction. In FY 2024–25, growth fell to 4.1 %, the weakest since the COVID era, per World Bank assessment. If the investment drought deepens, projections suggest a drop toward 3.3 % in 2025.

Over 100 garment factories have shuttered over the past year, costing tens of thousands of jobs (Daily Industry BD). Official unemployment hovers at 4.6 %, but a deeper reckoning of underemployment, youth joblessness, and hidden labor markets suggests far higher human cost (Daily Observer). Nearly 85 % of workers remain informal—no contracts, no social protection (Dhaka Tribune).

In industrial belts like Gazipur, police acknowledge many arrested for petty theft or street mugging are recently laid-off factory workers (New Age). When the state fails to provide, survival becomes the only logic, and crime swells to fill the void.

Theories of Yunus delivered to convince his Western philanthropists have failed to make financial relevance with Global investors. Yunus doesn’t just lack political acumen, he was too naïve to begin his step in the game. 

Lawlessness, State Terror, and Mob Carnage

Justice no longer exists as a concept, only as a performative façade masking systemic brutality and institutional collapse. Under the current interim regime, extrajudicial violence has not merely been tolerated; it has been routinized. In the first quarter of 2025 alone, at least 8 extrajudicial killings and 19 deaths in custody were documented.

Between August 2024 and March 2025, human rights monitors recorded 20 such killings, involving torture, beatings, and summary executions. Mob lynchings have surged with terrifying ferocity: between mid-2024 and mid-2025, at least 637 people were lynched—representing a twelvefold increase from the 51 deaths recorded in 2023.

This wave of vigilante violence has been met with state indifference—if not tacit encouragement. Simultaneously, religious minorities have been subjected to a coordinated campaign of persecution: between August 2024 and June 2025, 2,442 hate crimes—including arson, sexual assaults, desecration of temples and churches, and targeted killings—were recorded, underscoring a culture of impunity that has metastasized into open terror.

These are not isolated incidents but symptoms of a regime where law is weaponized, justice is ornamental, and human life is expendable.

Since Muhammad Yunus assumed office, there has been a disturbing rise in alleged political persecution through the legal system: arrests, false lawsuits, and invented murder charges serving as tools of harassment rather than justice. Beyond the courts, thousands have been detained under Operation Devil Hunt, with over 11,300 arrests reported by late February 2025, many allegedly including people with only tenuous or no links to criminal acts. 

Yunus never had, never tried for public mandate. Employed by the protesters of July uprising is far from being a democratic mandate. Yunus never had the courage to face a public referendum to justify his throne. He preferred to enjoy the authority, ban political parties without referendum and promote divisive rhetoric among the masses. 

Women, Children, and the Machinery of Cruelty

The sexual violence statistics are a national disgrace. In the first half of 2025, 481 rape cases were reported—nearing the total for all of 2024 (The Daily Star). Child rape cases, in just one seven-month span, rose by 75 % (The Daily Star).

Protests led by women or students are met with torture, rape threats, solitary confinement (Human Rights Watch). Ibtedayi teachers demanding job recognition were beaten, tear-gassed, and dispersed in January 2025 (JMBF).

Prisons continue to serve as killing grounds. Deaths in custody are frequent; euphemisms like “heart attacks” or “natural causes” mask systematic violence.

Corpses in Rivers: the Floating Dead

A macabre trend haunts Bangladesh’s waterways. River police data show that in 2025, an average of 43 bodies each month have been pulled from rivers, up from 36 per month in 2024. From January to July 2025 alone, 301 bodies were recovered; 92 remain unidentified. Narayanganj recorded 34 recoveries, Dhaka 32 (Daily Star).

In one case, a woman and a child were found floating in the Buriganga River, both strangled before being dumped, according to autopsy (Financial Post BD). In late August, a headless body was recovered from the Shitalakkhya River in Narayanganj; the victim was later identified as a 27-year-old man (Financial Post BD).

In Keraniganj, the bodies of a man and woman were discovered tied with a 50-kg rice sack, and another victim in a burqa drifted nearby (Financial Post BD).

In Netrokona District (March 2025), the bodies of three fish poachers were found in the Dhanu River after clashes involving community groups (bdnews24). In Chandpur, two older men were retrieved from the Dakatia River—one with visible stab wounds and a severed leg vein (Dhaka Tribune)¹⁷.

In Khulna, over 50 bodies were pulled from various rivers between August 2024 and September 2025; 20 remain unidentified (Khulna naval police). In Chandpur’s Meghna River, seven bodies from an Al Bakhira cargo vessel murder were handed over to families—and a probe committee was formed (BD Pratidin).

Notably, the body of journalist Bibhuranjan Sarkar—after threats and intimidation—was recovered from the Meghna River in Munshiganj in August 2025 (IFJ / BMSF).

These are not accidents or drownings; they are executions turned invisible, pollution turned weapon, rivers made into graveyards without funeral. 

Passport, Visas, and Global Shame

Bangladesh’s passport value has eroded, visa rejections are multiplying, and global watchdogs—HRW, Odhikar, UN human rights bodies—have flagged Dhaka for systemic violations.

The moral capital of the country is bankrupt. Investors and donors hesitate to engage with a government intertwined with terror, silence, and complicity.

Disasters as Symptoms, Not Anomalies

The October 13, 2025 garment-chemical factory fire in Dhaka, which killed 16 workers, was not a random accident — it was a preventable massacre. Locked rooftop escape doors and unchecked toxic gas turned the building into a sealed crematorium.

Days later, the Yunus government has failed to launch any credible investigation, identify the factory owners, or bring those responsible to justice.

No arrests have been made, no compensation schemes publicly disclosed, and no structural safety audits initiated. Instead, the administration has issued vague statements and deflected responsibility, shielding business interests at the expense of workers’ lives. This silence is not mere negligence — it is complicity. 

This is not a standalone incident, rather a pattern. The handling of the Gazi Tire Factory fire tragedy reflects a troubling pattern of negligence and institutional disregard for accountability.

Despite the devastating loss of life and clear safety failures, Yunus—under whose interim government the incident unfolded—failed to ensure a thorough, transparent investigation or meaningful compensation for victims’ families.

This inaction not only denied justice to the workers but also signaled an alarming indifference to labor rights and workplace safety. In the past 13 months, similar negligence has been observed in incidents such as the Hazaribagh factory fire (2024) and the Chittagong shipbreaking yard accidents (2024-2025), where victims were met with inadequate investigations and stalled compensation efforts.

By neglecting to pursue corporate responsibility and systemic reform, Yunus reinforced the vulnerability of industrial workers in Bangladesh, deepening mistrust between the state and its most exploited laborers. His failure to act decisively in the aftermath stands as a stark contradiction to his international image as a champion of social justice.

Over the past 13 months of the Yunus regime, Bangladesh’s labour sector has been trapped in a cycle of grand promises, fragile protections, and cynical neglect. The government’s repeated declarations of “historic reforms” amounted to little more than political theatre, as factory floors across the country continued to mirror a grim reality of wage theft, unsafe workplaces, and repressed voices.

While MoLE boasted of upcoming amendments to labour laws, millions of workers — especially in the sprawling informal sector — remained invisible to the legal system. Inspection bodies were underfunded and toothless, allowing factory owners to operate with impunity as thousands were laid off illegally, denied benefits, and silenced when they protested.

Unionization was stifled, particularly in Export Processing Zones, where rights existed only on paper, and “social audits” became nothing more than PR rituals for global brands. Worker unrest exploded repeatedly, from delayed Eid allowances to unpaid salaries and unsafe conditions, yet the government responded with empty press briefings and tokenistic committees.

The much-touted October 2025 labour law reform deadline became a symbol of inertia, tangled in corporate resistance and bureaucratic gamesmanship. The past year has laid bare a bitter truth: under Yunus’s leadership, labour rights were not defended — they were traded off, delayed, and dismissed, leaving workers to fight alone against a system designed to exploit them.

From Savior Icon to Enabler of Decay

Mohammad Yunus once embodied a hopeful alternative—microcredit, grassroots empowerment, moral leadership. Yet under his interim leadership, Bangladesh is unravelling in every direction: economic collapse, mob justice, sexual violence, extrajudicial killings, rivers flooded with corpses, and institutional impotence. From Teachers to slums, the elites to poets all have suffered under the Yunus’ reign of Terror. 

Yunus may not have physically ordered every atrocity, but he now presides over a regime that normalized them. His Nobel halo cannot conceal the inferno beneath. Rebuilding a nation demands more than symbolic leadership—it demands justice, accountability, and courage. Today, Bangladesh has none. Yunus had the opportunity to unite the nation and develop a social contract among the political parties. Instead what Yunus has contributed had cemented a pipeline for cycle of violence to multiply in the future. 

Disclaimer: Views expressed by writers in this section are their own and do not reflect Milli Chronicle’s point-of-view.

This was not a case of crowd control gone wrong. This was a premeditated act of state terror.

On July 16, 2025, Bangladesh witnessed one of the darkest and bloodiest chapters in its recent history. What unfolded in Gopalganj was not a random outbreak of violence—it was a calculated, state-sponsored massacre, deliberately executed by the interim government of Nobel Peace Prize laureate Muhammad Yunus. This regime, which came to power under the banner of restoring democracy, justice, and human rights, has now exposed its true face: repressive, authoritarian, and dangerous.

The government forces—comprising both police and military—opened fire on unarmed demonstrators in the heart of Gopalganj. At least four people were confirmed dead and more than a hundred sustained injuries. The deceased have been identified as Dipto Saha (25), Ramzan Kazi (24), Sohel Molla (35), and Imon Talukder (28)—all ordinary citizens. What they faced on that fateful day was anything but ordinary. Their crime? Defending the legacy of the Father of the Nation, Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, against a political organization that was permitted to spew venom unchecked.

The crisis was sparked by provocative and deeply offensive statements made by the National Citizens Party (NCP), a fringe group that enjoys the quiet backing of the Yunus administration. During their “March to Gopalganj” rally, NCP leaders vowed to “bury Mujibism” and destroy Bangabandhu’s mausoleum. For the people of Gopalganj—who consider Bangabandhu’s memory sacred—this was an open declaration of war.

In response, residents from various parts of the district, including Gandhiyashur, Ulpur, Chowrasta, and the old bus terminal, began gathering peacefully to protest these threats. These were not armed rebels or political militants. These were farmers, students, day laborers, and shopkeepers—united not by political affiliation but by a common sense of justice and respect for the country’s founding leader.

But instead of diffusing tensions or holding the NCP accountable, the government treated these peaceful demonstrators as enemies of the state. Troops and police descended on the crowd, opening fire without warning. Tear gas filled the air. Live bullets ripped through flesh. Social media videos show soldiers stomping on wounded protesters, dragging lifeless bodies, and making sure that those on the ground would not get up again.

The brutality was not limited to the moment of confrontation. Several reports indicate that bodies were secretly removed. In one particularly harrowing video, a police officer can be heard saying of a gravely injured man, “He’s pretending to be dead,” before tossing him like garbage into a police van. In another clip, white tissue protrudes from a bullet wound in a young man’s abdomen.

This was not a case of crowd control gone wrong. This was a premeditated act of state terror. The fact that multiple agencies coordinated this attack across several sites, under the watch of senior government advisors, makes it even more chilling. Sources reveal that the advisors for Home, Law, and Local Government were monitoring the situation in real-time from Police Headquarters, ensuring a seamless execution of this violent suppression.

From a legal perspective, the actions of the Yunus administration are indefensible. Articles 31, 32, and 35 of the Constitution of Bangladesh guarantee the right to life, personal security, and due process. None of these constitutional protections were upheld in Gopalganj. The victims were neither charged with crimes nor given a chance to defend themselves. They were summarily executed.

Domestic law—including the Police Act, the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC), and military conduct regulations—clearly stipulate that the use of deadly force must meet three criteria: necessity, legal authorization, and proportionality. None of these thresholds were satisfied. No police officer or soldier was harmed. No government property was destroyed. And yet, lethal force was used.

The crimes in Gopalganj also constitute clear violations of international law. Articles 3 and 5 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights affirm the right to life and the right to be free from cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment. Articles 6 and 7 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), to which Bangladesh is a signatory, prohibit arbitrary killing and torture by state actors. These treaties are not just symbolic—they carry binding legal obligations.

Most significantly, under Article 7 of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC), a “widespread or systematic attack directed against any civilian population” with knowledge of the attack constitutes a crime against humanity. The scale, coordination, and brutality of the crackdown in Gopalganj fit this definition. The state’s actions were not spontaneous reactions—they were carefully planned, organized, and executed.

Moreover, the psychological and political intent behind the crackdown—instilling fear in the populace and punishing dissent—aligns with the legal concept of persecution. The Rome Statute also defines persecution as a crime against humanity when it involves the intentional and severe deprivation of fundamental rights against a group or population.

The violence was accompanied by state-led information suppression. Mainstream media, many aligned with corporate interests or controlled by the administration, portrayed the protesters as aggressors. Headlines read, “Protesters Clash with NCP Supporters,” conveniently omitting the fact that the protesters were reacting to hate speech and threats against a national monument. Social media platforms saw posts taken down, accounts suspended, and internet speeds throttled to limit the spread of video evidence.

This chilling attempt to rewrite history in real-time is as dangerous as the violence itself. The Yunus administration not only targeted bodies in Gopalganj—it also targeted the truth.

It is also essential to question the deafening silence from the international community. In the past, Western governments, human rights organizations, and UN bodies have been quick to condemn incidents of far lesser gravity. Why then the muteness in the face of such a blatant and bloody abuse of power? The answer may lie in what experts call “strategic silence”—a diplomatic tactic used to maintain relationships with governments seen as useful for regional stability, investment, or geopolitical leverage.

This selective outrage is not just hypocritical—it is dangerous. It sends a message to repressive regimes that they can act with impunity, as long as they serve the right interests. But human lives are not bargaining chips. The people of Bangladesh are not expendable.

Muhammad Yunus, long hailed as a global icon of peace and innovation, now finds his name linked to one of the most heinous acts of state violence in the country’s history. His administration was not elected—it was installed. And with no democratic mandate, no transparency, and now no respect for life, it lacks all moral legitimacy.

Yunus cannot absolve himself by citing ignorance. As the head of government, he bears ultimate responsibility. The International Criminal Court must open a preliminary investigation into the events in Gopalganj. So must the UN Human Rights Council. Independent investigators must be granted immediate access to the affected regions, witnesses, and all government communications related to the crackdown.

Justice must also extend beyond prosecution. The families of the victims must receive reparations. Medical treatment must be provided to the wounded. And the right to protest—enshrined both in domestic and international law—must be restored and protected.

The world must speak now, not later. Every moment of silence adds another layer of injustice to the already unbearable burden borne by the victims’ families.

Let us also remember that this is not just a Gopalganj issue. It is a national crisis. Today it is Gopalganj—tomorrow it could be any district, any village, any street. This massacre marks a turning point in Bangladesh’s democratic journey. It is a test of our collective conscience, both within the country and beyond.

The names of Dipto, Ramzan, Sohel, and Imon are etched in blood into our national memory. Their deaths are not just personal tragedies—they are political warnings. Their sacrifice demands not only mourning but mobilization.

We urge all human rights defenders, legal bodies, international institutions, and concerned citizens of the world: do not let this massacre be swept under the rug. Demand accountability. Demand justice. Demand the truth.

The Yunus administration must be held accountable for crimes against humanity. Bangladesh cannot move forward if its people continue to be crushed under the boots of authoritarianism. Democracy is not built on the silence of the dead, but on the voices of the living demanding justice.

History will remember this day. And history will not forgive those who remained silent.