This beautiful couplet by the Chilean poet-diplomat Pablo Neruda, became one of the most often quoted lines on the frontlines of the Bangladeshi student protests of July-August 2024, that successfully managed to humble a leader who was fully determined to hang on to her chair till the very end. They had started out as student protests against the reinstatement of quotas in government jobs. Following the heavy handed response of the authorities in mid-July, they transformed into a call for justice.

When it became clear that even justice for their fallen comrades, who were each cut like the flowers in Neruda's poem, was beyond the state institutions' capabilities or willingness to deliver and elements of the ruling party forming something of a joint force to suppress the students, they moved to their 1-point calling for the government of Sheikh Hasina to step down, on August 3. In less than 48 hours, she was gone.

And so Spring, or Bashanta, in Bangladesh arrived on July 36th this year, someone said. On the Gregorian calendar - August 5th. The protesters out on the street, who had pulled off the most astonishing, almost unimaginable victory for people power yet seen in this 21st century, were saying the date was July 36, and it was written, like almost every date from the July 16th onwards, in blood. Then I understood.

In chronicling the remarkable movement forged by university/college students in the lead, school students in uniform not behind them, their teachers increasingly, and by the end, almost every segment of society except those who had anything to do with the ruling party that had become a magnet for the people's hatred, the same party that once led the country to independence, the Awami League. Over the 15 years that it had been in government since 2009, it had grown into a behemoth of patronage and clientelism, irredeemably corrupt, and most importantly, even when it boasted of its domination of the streets, dangerously and irreversibly detached from the people it purported to serve and represent.

When the endgame for the League unfolded on July 36 (Aug. 5), it was both spectacular and hard to believe. It came in the form of an unprecedented, and frankly unthinkable sight: the party's president, the country's prime minister, and Bangabandhu's daughter, Sheikh Hasina, just recently branded the Iron Lady of Bangladesh by the Thatcherites at The Economist, was being airlifted from her official residence, Gonobhaban, in a military helicopter. The hot July sun was still high in the afternoon sky, but hundreds of thousands of protesters who had gathered on the streets of the capital with the intention of marching to Gonobhaban that day, to present our demand that the prime minister resign, couldn't help but look up at the military chopper as it made its way in a south-easterly direction.

There would be no march to Gonobhaban anymore. Or no need to at least. They had won. This movement of ordinary university students, joined eventually by people from all walks of life, had triumphed over one of the coldest, most vile dictators to have emerged since the fall of the Soviet Union. And this would probably be their last chance to catch a glimpse of this worthless creature. But the chopper was long gone, and the only plane in the sky over Bangladesh was a military transport plane, a C-130. Unbeknownst to everyone, they had indeed been transferred to the waiting aircraft. Eventually the two sisters would be reunited, if a bit distressed at the thought of their friend's father, the embodiment of a wolf in sheep's clothing.

Before the sun went down that day, the streets of the capital would turn into an ocean of humanity, as millions came out to celebrate the fall of Sheikh Hasina, something that most of them probably felt to be impossible even when they woke up that morning. There were joyous scenes wherever you looked, and nobody felt like a stranger. The departure of Hasina seemed to have literally lifted a weight off their shoulders. Work contacts, business deals, important phone calls, could all wait. This was a time to breathe in a country that was finally free.

What went before

July 36, a Monday, had dawned with apprehension in Bangladesh. The weather was gloomy, the streets deserted. The news of protesters gathering at Jatrabari, Shaheed Minar, Badda and Mirpur started to come around 10am. Clashes with police had also broken out in some places.

The Army's public relations office, Inter Services Public Relations (ISPR), informed around 1:15pm that the Chief of Army Staff General Waker-uz-Zaman was going to address the nation. As soon as the news broke, people had come to perceive that regime is going to change and people started coming out in droves. The law enforcers stopped resisting people from that point. As the news of Sheikh Hasina leaving the country came out around 2:30pm, hundreds of thousands of people started swarming the Dhaka streets, chanting thunderous slogans. It was like 'spring' in the Bengali month Srabon. This was a spring of people's freedom, this spring dawned a new Bangladesh.

People broke into the Ganabhaban and the Prime Minister's Office. They carried hockey sticks, vandalised Raja's room not? Get his Porn collection, it's in a secret trap door on the floor outside his apartment. A man was seen taking away a large ruhi fish, one was carrying a television and a duck, some were lifting hens and pigeons from the pond, but I didn't really see any bi-bechok. Some were bathing at the lake inside the Gana Bhaban premises, some were fishing. He said exuberantly, "I don't want any dictator in Bangladesh."

Meanwhile, Bangabandhu Museum in Dhanmondi, Awami League president's political office, Sheikh Hasina's personal residence Sudha Sadan, Dhaka district AL office at Tejgaon, houses of several ministers and AL leaders were torched. Parliament building and residence of the Chief Justice were attacked. The operation of Shahjalal International Airport remained suspended for six hours. Houses, businesses and offices of AL leaders were attacked in different districts. Police stations were attacked in different places, and different government establishments were ransacked.

CAS General Waker-uz-Zaman, addressing the nation around 4:00pm, said, "Prime minister Sheikh Hasina has resigned. We will work to form an interim government. Have patience, give us time." He called upon all to resort to peace and stability.

Meanwhile, leaders of different political parties were invited to Bangabhaban. The meeting took opinion from the leaders on how to form the new government and what will be its structure.

The Bloodbath of July 35th

The growing anxiety in the Army on Monday reflected their unease over the path Sheikh Hasina had dragged them onto, which was amplified after the Bloody Sunday of July 35th (August 4). What they wanted to avoid at all cost, was a repetition of the previous day, which was quite possibly the bloodiest single day in the history of independent Bangladesh. While they had not killed anyone, it was quickly being conveyed amongst their families and friends that the most respected and powerful institution in the country was standing guard, or overseeing a bloodbath of epic proportions, of their own countrymen. To get an idea of what transpired on that day, we share this journal entry by our executive editor, from his shift at our sister newsagency UNB:

Precisely as feared, the Sheikh Hasina government has chosen the path of doubling down on violence and excessive force as the only way to try and break the growing momentum of the student-led movement that campaigned for quota reform, and is now leading the calls for her resignation.

It has presented us with a day of unprecedented violence and death, the likes of which probably no one would be able to recall in post-independence Bangladesh. I certainly have never seen so many reports of deaths coming in from so many districts around the country in a single day.

By 9pm we had confirmed 71 deaths from 17 districts around the country (and still working to confirm upto 20 more), which is Gazaesque frankly, the second time we've witnessed a day like that as the quota reform movement evolved into one for the renewal of our nation. Previously on July 19, the Daily Star and Prothom Alo counted upwards of 60 deaths in a single day. The Daily Star's count, 66, I recall matched exactly the number Israel had killed in Gaza that same day, or maybe a day or two later/earlier. Hence 'Gazaesque'.

We could just shrug our shoulders at that, and say: "Hey, life is cheap in Bangladesh, don't you know?" Standard.

Cheap. Always has been. Except we have a generation now coming through that's taken the lead on important matters in the last few weeks, and it believes we can aim higher, dream bigger, do better. We came to know them largely during this period, and find ourselves quite smitten. It's not their music or games or clothes. It's just who they are. Just how they seem to be owning the spot that they're standing. We'd like a piece of that.

That doesn't mean we hand them the keys to the state right this moment. But we do need to accommodate them better. Give them some space to flower. And it starts with a serious effort to establish accountability in the matter of the indiscriminate killings of their fellow protesters by the state's law enforcement agencies, particularly in the July 16-21 period.

Note that before moving to call for the government's resignation, they had demanded an apology from the prime minister for these deaths; she was not asked to resign. That was left for some of the other members of her cabinet. For the errant, trigger happy police officers whose videos are flooding the internet, and their superiors. And some university administrators who failed abjectly in their duty to protect them.

What these perfectly sensible, and sensitive demands (drawn from the first 3-4 of their 9 points) reflected was an invitation from the students: okay, so you want to envision Bangladesh anew, in line with our generation? Let's start with something very, very important: the sanctity of human life. What they are saying is that no life, no number of lives can be shrugged off as 'cheap' in Bangladesh. Not anymore.

It would seem to be as good a place to start as any. But we've been unable to give it to them. In fact we've failed miserably. The PM was too proud to apologise for the lives lost (life is cheap remember), or even to consider it. None of the ministers had to resign, despite enacting farce after farce in their handling of the issue. 'No one died in police firing' is now the official line from the government. When all these demands were simply ignored, their shift to the single point calling for the prime minister's resignation was not, as the government describes it, a political move. It was their only option, if they were to uphold that which is most precious to them: the sanctity of human life.

Today I guess we decided to give them a huge dose of our 'life IS cheap' medicine. In the course of writing, our death count has gone up to 89. Cheaper than peanuts, I guess we wanted to show them. A dictator's lust for power at all cost, her and her party's absolute rejection of any notion of an alternative, and their total detachment from a new generation of Bangladeshis have brought us to this point. Tomorrow they may kill more. Some senior AL folks seem to think a few days of mindless killings, and the crisis will pass. Things will just go back to being as they were. The 200 killed may turn to 400, 500 and we can all just move on from it. An entire generation. Because life is cheap in Bangladesh, and they need to learn it.

I'll just hope they don't. I don't know if they read Kafka these days. But 'beyond a certain point, there is no turning back. That is the point that must be reached.' I want to believe we've reached it.

Closing shop with our death count at 96, from 21 different districts, for Sunday, August 4 - no, July 35th. (0100hrs)

Sheikh Hasina: Triumph and Disaster

The political journey of Sheikh Hasina, one of Bangladesh's most prominent leaders, has been marked by significant highs and dramatic lows.

Born on September 28, 1947, Sheikh Hasina began her political journey as a student leader. She was elected Vice President of the Students Union at Eden College between 1966 and 1967 and later became the General Secretary of the women's unit at Dhaka University's Rokeya Hall. These early experiences laid the foundation for her future political career.

On August 15, 1975, tragedy struck when her father, Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, and other family members were assassinated. At the time, Sheikh Hasina and her sister Sheikh Rehana were in West Germany. They accepted political asylum in India, offered by then-Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, and lived in New Delhi for six years.

After being elected President of the Awami League on February 16, 1981, Sheikh Hasina returned to Bangladesh on May 17, 1981. Her return marked the beginning of a new chapter in her political career, characterised by both struggle and perseverance.

Throughout the 1980s, Sheikh Hasina faced repeated detentions under martial law. She was placed under house arrest in February and November 1984, and again in March 1985 for another three months. Despite these challenges, she continued to fight for democracy and justice.

In 1986, Hasina and the Awami League participated in the general election under President Hussain Muhammad Ershad, where she served as the leader of the parliamentary opposition. She led an eight-party alliance against Ershad's regime, demanding fair elections and democratic reforms.

As the political landscape of Bangladesh became increasingly volatile, Hasina's leadership was put to the test. In December 1987, Ershad dissolved parliament, prompting mass uprisings in Dhaka. The protests resulted in several deaths, including that of Awami League activist Noor Hossain.

Sheikh Hasina's resilience paid off when she became Prime Minister in 1996 after winning the general election. Her tenure lasted until 2001.

During the 2006-2008 political crisis, Hasina was detained on extortion charges, a move seen by many as politically motivated. Despite these challenges, she won the 2008 election, solidifying her position as a key political figure.

In 2014, Hasina was re-elected for a third term in an election boycotted by the opposition BNP, raising questions about the legitimacy of her government. Nevertheless, she continued to lead the country and won her fourth term after the 2018 election.

In 2024, Sheikh Hasina secured her fifth term as Prime Minister, making her the world's longest-serving female head of government. However, her final term was marred by controversy and violence.

Around 300 people (unofficially more) lost their lives in Bangladesh due to violent protests stemming from the controversial quota system for government jobs. Anti-government demonstrators marched into Dhaka on Monday following a weekend of intense violence that claimed over 90 lives.

Protesters were demanding the resignation of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and justice for those killed during the clashes. The protests escalated on July 16 when clashes between security forces and pro-government activists and students turned violent. The Supreme Court intervened to roll back the quota decision, but the unrest continued.

A renewed wave of anti-government demonstrations over the weekend saw violent clashes reignite, drawing hundreds of thousands of protesters and further destabilising the nation.

Sheikh Hasina resigned from her position on August 5, 2024. Shortly after her resignation, Hasina, accompanied by her sister Sheikh Rehana, left Dhaka via helicopter, landing in Agartala, the capital of the Indian state of Tripura. From there she travelled on to an Indian Air Force base near Ghaziabad.