Once upon a time, there was a prince..
The crown prince of crime, corruption and kleptomaniac.
Born to a military dictator and a Prime Minister charged with corruption, he shoved the country down to the pit of injustice and illegal affairs. From fanning militancy to persecuting minorities to smuggling arms, Tarique Rahman tried all the methods to make democracy fall flat on the face. Power blinded him when their party BNP, headed by his mother, formed the government in Bangladesh in 2001, allying with war criminals. The following five years made a great history with some great events in Bangladesh – hurling grenades at a rally of the opposition leader, orchestrating simultaneous bombing in 64 districts, supplying 10 trucks of illegal arms to the country, offering refuge to terrorists, running riots against the minority.
Too much on the plate!
His story of corruption crossed borders and became global. Even the United States was scared of his violent tactics, considering him as a serious threat to the US interest in Bangladesh, as revealed by the whistleblowing Wikileaks. They tagged him as the ‘image of the kleptomaniac government’ and ‘guilty of egregious corruption. Tarique Rahman created the culture of bribery, embezzlement, and corruption in the country, as observed by then US ambassador James F Moriarty.
The diplomat also recommended that Tarique could be denied entry into the US for the aforementioned reasons. His meeting with an ISI top boss and Bombay underworld don Dawood Ibrahim reinforced his image as a patron of militancy. Once Pandora’s Box of excesses committed by him started coming to the light, he got convicted in many cases and is living in exile. A proven mastermind of the 2004-grenade attack against then opposition leader and the current Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina is awarded life imprisonment.
Though living in exile saved him from being jailed, his legacy of making hateful comments and outright lies hasn’t ended yet & no one knows if that will stop ever!
