Sirajganj, Bangladesh — One year after a horrific mob attack wiped out the entire staff of Enayetpur Police Station, the families of the slain officers are still waiting for justice. On August 4, 2024, during a violent nationwide uprising, a large mob stormed the station in Sirajganj and brutally beat every on-duty officer to death. At least 15 policemen were killed in one of the deadliest single attacks on law enforcement in Bangladesh’s history. Dozens more, including a female constable, Rehena Parvin, survived with injuries.
Today, the station stands rebuilt and back in operation, but the memory of that day remains a source of anguish for survivors and victims’ families — and no perpetrator has yet been held accountable.
“My husband went on duty that day and came back as a corpse… Will we ever live to see his killers punished?” cried Roksana Akter, widow of Constable Hafizur Islam, who was among the fallen.
Like Roksana, many bereaved relatives say they have spent the past year in grief and frustration, as investigations drag on with little progress.
“The government gave us some aid, but no one can tell me when the trial will start. My young son still waits for his father,” Roksana said, her voice breaking.
A Day of Unspeakable Horror
The attack unfolded amid the turmoil of Bangladesh’s student-led “July Revolution” — mass protests and clashes that ultimately toppled the government of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina in early August 2024. Sirajganj, a district in northwestern Bangladesh, was a flashpoint of violence.
Around midday on August 4, 2024, hundreds of demonstrators — mostly youths and pro-Islamist opposition activists — converged on Enayetpur Police Station during a “non-cooperation” anti-government protest.
Initial reports say the station’s chief, Officer-in-Charge (OC) Abdur Razzak, tried to defuse tensions: using a loudspeaker, he urged the crowd to remain peaceful and assured them, “This police station belongs to the people; please do not damage it,” according to the official case report later filed by police. The protesters actually dispersed at first.
Moments later, however, hell broke loose. A second wave of attackers, armed with sticks, knives and locally made weapons, suddenly encircled and besieged the station, as described in eyewitness accounts and the police FIR (first information report).
The FIR, filed 21 days after the incident by the Muhammad Yunus administration, alleges that the mob was led by local Awami League opponents—naming neighborhood Awami League leader Ahmed Mustafa Khan (Bacchu) as the instigator. Awami League officials strongly deny any involvement, while independent witnesses suggest the attackers were anti-Hasina protesters, including Islamist student activists from a nearby college.
As the mob pressed in, police threw tear gas to disperse them, but were quickly overwhelmed. The attackers set fire to parts of the compound, including the officers’ quarters and the OC’s residence, according to multiple reports.
With flames spreading, panicked police personnel ran out of the burning building one by one — and were captured by the mob. What happened next was sheer carnage: the protesters beat the officers to death with rods and machetes, even crushing some of their skulls, eyewitnesses told local media.
Photos from the aftermath show the shocking brutality. One officer’s body was found hanging from a tree with a rope, and three bodies were retrieved from a nearby pond, where they had been dumped. Eight other corpses lay in a heap beside a mosque, bloodied, stripped of their uniforms.
“They grabbed them and killed them by smashing their heads,” said a local journalist who witnessed the slaughter, describing how each officer who fled the fire was hunted down.
The identity of the attackers remains officially unknown, but witnesses reported many young men, some under 20, wielding Jamaat-e-Islami and Islami Chhatra Shibir banners — the student wing of an Islamist party — among the crowd.
By the time an army unit arrived in the afternoon to secure the area, it was too late — the station was ransacked and 13 policemen lay dead on the spot, with two more dying of injuries later at hospital, bringing the death toll to 15 officers.
Every police member present was killed or hurt; dozens more were injured in the melee but survived. Among the dead were OC Abdur Razzak (45) and a mix of sub-inspectors and constables — essentially the entire complement of the station. It was the single worst loss of police lives in any one incident during the uprising.
More Bloodshed
That same day, violence across Sirajganj claimed at least 12 more lives. Six Awami League activists were killed in an attack on the party’s office in nearby Raigonj, while arson attacks on the homes of ruling party politicians in Sirajganj town led to additional deaths.
Journalist Pradeep Bhowmik, who was working at the Raigonj Press Club, was dragged out and publicly beaten and hacked to death on the street by activists from Jamaat-e-Islami, the BNP, and anti-discrimination student movements.
Reports also indicate that three people died in clashes between Awami League and BNP supporters in Sirajganj town. Two more were burned to death when anti-government protesters set fire to the home of Awami League leader and MP Jannat Ara Henry.
Nationwide, August 4 became known as “Black Sunday,” with over 90 people killed in protest-related violence across multiple districts—including 13 police officers slain at Enayetpur, according to police and media tallies.
Victims and Heroes: The Fallen Police Officers
The 15 police personnel who lost their lives at Enayetpur ranged from veteran officers to young constables just starting their careers. OC Abdur Razzak, the station chief, had been a police officer for 22 years and was known in his hometown for his dedication. He was actually about to be transferred to another district and had planned a visit home to Chapainawabganj that month — instead, he returned to his family in a coffin.
“My brother was supposed to come home on leave… now he’s coming back as a lifeless body,” Razzak’s younger sister Mawnjera Alif said, weeping at their village house in Shalimdanga.
“They attacked the station and killed my brother. We want justice — no other mother should have to lose her child like this,” she told Prothom Alo at his funeral, as grieving relatives crowded around Razzak’s distraught elderly mother.
Razzak, 45, was the second of eight siblings and had no children of his own — but he was the beloved caretaker of his extended family. “He looked after everyone, he was the pillar for us,” his sister said, describing the shock and sorrow that gripped the entire community at his murder. At the family home, neighbors and friends poured in to pay respects.
Razzak’s older brother, Rezaul Karim, recalled seeing the battered body at the morgue. “They had hacked him so brutally… Why would anyone do this to policemen who were only doing their duty?” he lamented, showing relatives a photo of the body and triggering fresh sobs in the room.
The other victims included Sub-Inspector (SI) Rois Uddin Khan, SI Tahsenuzzaman, SI Pronobesh Kumar Biswas, Constable Nazmul Hossain, Constable Anisur Rahman Molla, Assistant SI Obaidur Rahman, Constable Abdus Salek, Constable Hafizur Islam, Constable Robiul Alam Shah, Constable Humayun Kabir, Constable Ariful Islam, Constable Riazul Islam, Constable Shahin Uddin, and Constable Hanif Ali.
Some of them were barely in their twenties. Many had young families — Constable Hafizur Islam, for example, left behind a toddler son who still asks when his father is coming home.
National Duty
The interim government under Muhammad Yunus has failed to accord proper respect and recognition to the 15 policemen who died in the line of duty, upholding their responsibilities with sincerity and courage.
In contrast, immediately after the August 4 massacre, the previous government had declared them national heroes. Their names were formally recognized as “martyrs” by the President and the police, and official tributes were paid.
Police headquarters had assured that the families of those who sacrificed their lives in such dire circumstances would receive full support, and that the perpetrators would be brought to justice.
Yet, a year later, those promises remain unfulfilled. For the victims’ families, one painful question remains unanswered: Will their loved ones’ blood be shed in vain?
Impunity and Delayed Justice
Despite the heinousness of the crime, there have been no convictions or even identified perpetrators publicly named for the Enayetpur massacre to date. Investigations have stalled, much to the dismay of the victims’ families and colleagues.
“It’s been a year and we don’t even have the autopsy reports for the murdered policemen, let alone a charge sheet,” said a frustrated police investigator in Sirajganj, noting that bureaucratic delays in forensic reports have prevented the case from moving forward.
According to officials, the post-mortem examinations were done at a local medical college, but as of August 2025 the investigators have not received the reports. Similarly, ballistic and explosives analysis reports related to the station arson are pending with the Dhaka CID lab. “Without these, we cannot finalize our investigation report,” said Farid Uddin, the current Investigating Officer, defending the slow progress.
Families of the victims view these delays as inexcusable — or even deliberate. “If even a massacre of police takes a backseat, what does that say about our justice system?” one relative remarked bitterly to the press. Indeed, the case has become highly politicized.
It took 21 days after the incident for an FIR to even be filed: on August 27, 2024, Sub-Inspector Abdul Malek on behalf of the new government finally lodged a murder case over the Enayetpur attack.
In that complaint, instead of identifying the student protesters or Islamist activists widely known to have led the mob, the police accused local leaders of the ousted ruling party, the Awami League.
The FIR named four Awami League figures (including Enayetpur Awami League President Ahmed “Bacchu” and others) as orchestrators, and bizarrely listed “5,000–6,000 unidentified” people as co-accused.
Awami League members say this is a brazen falsehood and scapegoating. “Those men they blamed in the FIR were nowhere near the station — they were being attacked themselves that day!” insisted one local Awami League official, pointing out that the Awami League was the target of violence across Sirajganj on Aug 4, not the instigator.
In fact, multiple independent reports indicated it was anti-Hasina groups — including supporters of the opposition BNP and the Islamist Jamaat-e-Islami — who carried out coordinated attacks on police and Awami League targets that day.
Rights observers argue the new regime has twisted the narrative to pin the blame on their political rivals. Human Rights Watch, in an analysis of the post-uprising justice process, noted that the interim authorities seem “more focused on extracting vengeance on Hasina’s supporters than on prosecuting crimes” committed during the uprising.
The interim government in power was installed after Sheikh Hasina’s resignation on August 5, 2024. Nobel Peace laureate Dr. Muhammad Yunus became Chief Adviser (head of government) leading a military-backed interim administration, following the student-led “revolution” that forced Hasina to flee to India.
This new regime, while initially welcomed by many protesters, has since been accused of establishing “ochlocracy” — rule by mob — and enabling widespread human rights abuses against Awami League supporters. In October 2024, the Yunus-led government issued a controversial immunity order effectively pardoning all so called “patriotic” participants in the uprising.
The official order, announced on October 14, stated that “students and citizens who put forth all efforts to make this uprising successful will not face prosecution, arrest, or harassment for their acts between July 15 and August 8, 2024.”
This blanket amnesty covering the period of unrest sparked outraged headlines — “Immunity order sparks fears of justice denied,” warned Radio France Internationale, noting that such impunity would shield perpetrators of even grave crimes.
For the families of the murdered policemen, that fear has become reality. No one has been arrested for actually killing the 15 officers. Instead, the crackdown after the uprising has focused almost entirely on Awami League figures.
Over the past year, the police in Sirajganj have filed at least 9 cases related to the day’s violence, implicating 672 named suspects (mostly opposition activists) and thousands of unnamed ones across the district.
In case after case, local Awami League leaders are among the accused — including in the Enayetpur police killings case, where the former Awami League MP and minister Abdul Latif Biswas was detained and later shown arrested as a suspect.
By early 2025, at least 163 Awami League leaders and activists in Sirajganj — from ex-ministers and MPs to union-level politicians — had been rounded up in connection with various charges stemming from the uprising.
Many of them, like ex-Minister Latif Biswas, insist they are innocent scapegoats. “They needed to blame someone to cover up who really did it,” a defense lawyer for one of the Awami League accused said, arguing that the real culprits are enjoying impunity.
Indeed, members of the opposition who were allegedly involved have faced little consequence. In a leaked video that surfaced online, a local BNP leader in Sirajganj was heard bragging about “our boys” beating 15 cops to death to “topple Hasina’s regime”, effectively claiming credit for the Enayetpur attack.
Yet, no action was taken against him or his associates after this admission. “On the contrary, the people who openly boasted about killing police are walking free,” said an Awami League spokesperson, “while our party leaders rot in jail on fabricated charges.” This stark double standard has reinforced the families’ belief that the truth is being buried.
A Nation in Turmoil
The Enayetpur police station massacre was not an isolated incident, but rather one extreme example of the chaos and violence that engulfed Bangladesh during and after the 2024 uprising.
Over 44 police officers were killed nationwide in the course of those protests, according to an official tally by the Chief Adviser’s Press Wing — including the 15 at Enayetpur, the highest toll in any single location.
Mobs of radicalized students and opposition supporters attacked most of the police stations or outposts across the country in late July and early August 2024, often ransacking and burning them.
In Dhaka, protesters torched cars, buses, and even parts of government buildings, while running battles with security forces turned the capital into what one observer called a “war zone”. When Hasina’s long-ruling Awami League government fell on August 5, celebratory mobs harassed and beat up known Awami League figures in the streets.
Since then, under the interim government, mob violence has continued to erupt with alarming frequency — often targeting Awami League supporters and symbols of the old regime. Army and police personnel have at times stood by or even accompanied these vigilante groups, according to numerous eyewitness reports and human rights organizations.
Homes of Awami League politicians have been raided and looted by crowds. Attacks on political prisoners inside court premises have been reported regularly, with throngs of rival activists assaulting detained Awami League leaders during legal hearings.
Ain O Salish Kendra, a leading human rights organisation, reported that at least 318 people, including children, were killed between August 5 — the day of Hasina’s ouster — and August 8.
The Bangladesh Hindu, Buddhist, Christian Unity Council reported 2,010 incidents, including murder and rape, from August 4-20.
The climate of fear and repression in Bangladesh has only hardened. While the interim government claims it is preparing to hold new elections and restore democracy, it has also banned the Awami League and initiated war crimes-like trials against Hasina and top Awami leaders in absentia.
Thousands of Awami League supporters remain in hiding to avoid arbitrary arrest, according to human rights groups. “The interim government appears stuck — juggling an unreformed security sector, violent hardliners, and political groups bent on vengeance against Hasina’s camp,” observed Human Rights Watch, noting that hopes for a truly rights-respecting democracy remain unfulfilled.
“We Want Justice”
Against this turbulent backdrop, the families of the Enayetpur martyrs fear their loved ones will become just footnotes in a larger power struggle. Early on, the interim authorities had held up the slain policemen as heroes, even organizing memorials.
“Police Week” events in January saw officials lay wreaths for fallen officers including those of Enayetpur, and the government declared all 15 as “National Martyr Police” to honor their sacrifice. But for the families, these gestures ring hollow without accountability.
“They celebrate Police Week and place flowers for the martyrs — but will they ever catch the people who hacked our brother to death?” asked OC Razzak’s eldest brother in anguish. Frontline police themselves are demoralized.
“If we can’t protect our own or get justice for them, what message does that send?” one junior officer in Sirajganj remarked, admitting many of his colleagues feel unsafe and unsupported.
Analysts warn that failing to deliver justice for such a brazen massacre of law enforcers sets a dangerous precedent. “When a symbol of the state — a police station — is attacked and the state does nothing, it emboldens the mob and undermines the rule of law,” said security analyst Tanvir Ahmed, adding that impunity now could fuel even more extreme violence in the future.
The unresolved Enayetpur case is frequently cited by critics as evidence of “victor’s justice” under the interim regime — where crimes committed by those aligned with the new power structure are ignored. International rights organizations have called for independent investigations into all deaths during the 2024 turmoil, including the police killings, but no such inquiry has materialized yet.
For now, families like Roksana Akter’s can only cling to memories and a fading hope. At a recent gathering, the widows and orphans of the fallen Enayetpur policemen lit candles and offered prayers at a makeshift memorial outside the rebuilt station. Tears flowed freely as the names of the 15 heroes were read aloud.
“We just want those who did this to be punished, nothing more,” said Roksana, holding her young son who clutched a photograph of his father in uniform. Her plea is heartbreakingly simple, and echoed by every victim’s loved ones: “We want justice.”
