Nobonita Chowdhury

As you’ve all heard by now, we had a hostage situation at the Holey Artisan Bakery in the evening of Friday, July 1st. The attack led to 28 death casualties among which 20 were hostages. In the midst of this entire ruckus, we as bystanders haven’t been doing much to help the situation either. Detailed reports on the outside and the inside situation of hostages were only giving these terrorists the upper hand. All the news channels had been recording live footage of the rescue team going in, and on July 2nd 10:20 AM, The Daily Star published a detailed report on the exchange of texts between two brothers, one of whom was trapped inside the bakery. Whether the texts sent by the hostage were genuine or monitored doesn’t matter. Publishing this on mainstream media is just endangering the lives of the hostages, making the rescue mission even more difficult. The terrorists already have an advantage; we are just making things easier for them. I know that it is the media’s job to publish as much info as they can gather. However, for the sake of the lives being endangered, the information should be released strategically. No information leakage could be of greater worth than the life of an actual human being.
The same goes for social media. I’ve come across many posts playing the blame game regarding the hostage situation. A lot of them were criticizing the police force for being “stupid”, while many have passed it off as a government plot. My point is: you’re not doing anything to help the situation. Yes, our police force may be corrupt to an extent. So is our government. But at times of a national crisis, they are the ones best qualified to handle the situation, while we as bystanders can only watch from the sidelines and pray for the best. Criticizing the folks who are trying to fix a dire situation is the worst thing you can do. These policemen work for 20-30,000 Tk per month. We blame them for being bribe takers. But that evening, they were the ones who risked their lives for the sake of this city. I wonder how many citizens would be willing to trade places with them for that salary. Or even five times that salary? Certainly not your favorite celebrities.
But nevertheless, I’m not here to generate more hate. We have suffered a terrible loss. What terrifies me even more is that I could’ve been among them. When I’m in Dhaka for the summer, I hang out with my friends as well. Just like the Berkeley and Emory students who lost their lives in the attack. So instead of criticizing, or hating on a religion or nationality, I ask you to spread love. For love is always stronger than hate.