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The rise of mob justice in Bangladesh

When the public decides to play the role of both the judge and the executioner it becomes mob justice or jungle justice. It is public lynching of the people who the mob judges as guilty. It ignores the proper way of the law and investigation and it is simply fueled by the rage of a crowd of people. So, there are quite a few cases where innocent lives are lost in this barbaric process.

Bangladesh is no stranger to mob justice. In fact it is a fairly familiar part of her society. The people of Bangladesh have been beating up people who they judged as criminals in the form of an angry mob through generations. The more serious cases of mob lynching where multiple people lose their lives were always sporadic. One of those serious cases of mob lynching happened back in 2011, at Aminbazar in Dhaka, six students lost their lives on the night of Shab-e-Barat when the crowd suspected them to be robbers. Most of the times these ‘victims’ are lucky enough to reach the doors of Police Station with their lives and there are very few who fail to survive. So, although mob justice existed in Bangladesh, but it never reached the level of a plague. Well, not until recently that is.

One day, on July 2019, suddenly out of nowhere, there was a sick rumour in the air, "Padma Bridge wants blood, Padma Bridge work is shutting down for the lack of blood."

This clearly outrageous story was further backed by another incident. This happened on 18 July, Thursday in Netrakona, a 22 year old man was caught red handed with the beheaded head of a boy. People became scared and angry, a mob came into being and beat the said culprit to death. The process of this public execution was recorded on mobile phones along with the severed head of the boy, and was later uploaded on the social media.

It is a well-known fact, just how much rumour-friendly the social media are, and they helped much to spread the graphic photos and videos. This gave birth to a brand new, modified rumour, "People are abducting and beheading children as a sacrifice for the Padma Bridge." Not long after that, that rumour morphed into a terrible plague and began to claim lives when an angry mob killed five people and injured several others when they suspected these people to be child abductors who were ‘beheading children’ as sacrefice.

Rumours have always been treated with extreme enthusiasm in Bangladesh. Especially if this rumour is related to something super-natural, and coupled with the exciting reality of the much anticipated Padma Bridge; this particular plague took little time to spread throughout the entire country.

In the blink of an eye, everyone was talking about it. It became a popular topic of discussion among the masses. Some fully believed it, some half believed it and some simply blew it away as just a rumour. None the less, people still talked about it at their home, at their workplaces and at the tea stalls. They used it to scare the little children and also as a source of some cheap laughter. The Dark Forces behind it all worked hard to make it a trending subject of discussion.

Gradually, this rumour successfully created a panic in the masses. They became extremely sensitive to the beings called ‘child abductors’. The atmosphere reeked of gasoline, waiting for a random spark to ignite into a devastating inferno.

The public became suspicious, weary and paranoid. Their hearts itched to get their hand on the said ‘child abductors’ and perform the act of justice. And, eventually the crowd exploded with a blind fury.

It happened at Badda in Dhaka. The victim was a woman, a single mother named Taslima Begum Renu, who went to a local school to ask about the admission process into the school for her children. But, she was assumed as a ‘child abductor’ and was brutally beaten to death by the Mob. No one was patient enough to hear her words of explanation.

Another victim was also a woman, who was attacked by the local Mob at Savar in Dhaka, for acting ‘suspiciously’. She too, died. The Mob also killed a man named Shaheen Parvez, who was deaf and a mute for the same reason. While in another incident of the same kind, a man was beaten to death at a tea garden at Kalomganj upazila in Moulvibazar.

The mob attacked two men, successfully killing one and injuring other, for talking to a group of children in Keraniganj. The Mob also beat up a mentally challenged woman, Hasina Begum at the Rafayetpur union are in Kustia. They again attacked another mentally challenged woman in Madaripur. They tied her to a tree and tortured her until the Police arrived and rescued her.

The ingenious people of Bangladesh managed to weaponize this rumour and used it for simple revenge. They beat up a group of people who were held over catching fish in a pond and then somehow later became the so called child abductors. A house owner spread the rumour that one of his tenants was a child abductor, this successfully gathered a mob and they beat him too. In another incident at Shripur in Gazipur, a married couple accused each other as ‘child abductor’ in public due to a quarrel, this confused the public; so they took the simple root and beat up them both. The mob also beat up the couple’s innocent friend who was accompanying them as a bonus.

In some areas children stopped going to school in fear of being abducted. Even the begger’s started carrying their identification card (which they never do) lest they might be suspected as a child abductor.

Similar things continues to happen all over the country while the law enforcement force struggled to put a leash on this dangerous situation.

Now, several questions come up when one thinks about this situation. But let us focus on the most important three. What makes a person participate in mob violence? Why did mob justice reach such an extreme state? Why now and what can be done to stop it?

To further understand the subject, we have to seek help from Social Psychology.

Mob justice is closely related to crowd psychology or mob psychology. This particular branch of social psychology have been explored by the likes of Gustave Le Bon, Gabriel Tarde, Sigmund Freud, and Steve Reicher. This field relates to the behaviors and thought processes of both the individual crowd members and the crowd as an entity. Crowd behavior is heavily influenced by the loss of responsibility of the individual and the impression of universality of behavior, both of which increase with crowd size.

Experts have come up with several theories to explain crowd psychology. Gustave Le Bon theory, Freudian theory, Deindividuation theory, Convergence theory, Emergent norm theory etc. are some of the most prominat ones among them.

Out of all these theories, two of them; Deindividuation theory and Emergent norm theory might be able to help explain the situation in Bangladesh.

In the article ‘Examining the mob mentality’ the author Megan Donley asked Tamara Avant, the Psychology program director at South University of Savannah some questions about deindividuation. And here’s what Tamara Avant had to say about it:

“When people are part of a group, they often experience deindividuation, or a loss of selfawareness. When people deindividuate, they are less likely to follow normal restraints and inhibitions and more likely to lose their sense of individual identity. Groups can generate a sense of emotional excitement, which can lead to the provocation of behaviors that a person would not typically engage in if alone. Think about the last sporting event or concert you attended. It’s have been yelling or singing the way you were if you were the only person doing it! The group seems to make some behaviors acceptable that would not be acceptable otherwise.”

Avant also stated that, “Deindividuation obviously does not occur every time people get together in a group, and there are some group characteristics that increase the likelihood of violence, such as group size and physical anonymity. First, many people believe they cannot be held responsible for violent behavior when part of a unlikely that you would n mob because they perceive the violent action as the group’s (e.g., “everyone was doing it”) rather than their own behavior. When in a large group, people tend to experience a diffusion of responsibility. Typically, the bigger a mob, the more its members lose self-awareness and become willing to engage in dangerous behavior. Second, physical anonymity also leads to a person experiencing fewer social inhibitions. When people feel that their behavior cannot be traced back to them, they are more likely to break social norms and engage in violence.

Group violence is most likely to occur when the group is large, people are able to remain anonymous, and people experience a diffusion of responsibility. Certain situations also play a role, such as when resources are scarce, we are surrounded by like-minded people, and/or when emotions are aroused.”

The Emergent norm theory presents a way of identifying the prime suspects who are more proactive individuals and lead the crowd to a violent direction.

In the ‘Encyclopedia of Psychology’ Stephen Reicher states that crowds have little unity at their outset, but during a period of milling about, key members suggest appropriate actions, and following members fall in line, forming the basis for the crowd's norms. Also, in the ‘Encyclopedia of Social Psychology’ Manstead says that key members are identified through distinctive personalities or behaviors. These garner attention, and the lack of negative response elicited from the crowd as a whole stands as tacit agreement to their legitimacy. Again in the ‘Handbook of Psychology’, D. R. Forsyth says, the followers form the majority of the mob, as people tend to be creatures of conformity who are heavily influenced by the opinions of others.

Young people, especially the teenagers are more emotional, impulsive and are prone to react to the incidents such as the ‘child abduction’ and murder. So, they are usually most likely to take part in a mob. As we have seen with the case of the killing of Taslima Begum Renu; the prime accused, Ibrahim Ridoy was just a 19 year old who used to sell vegetables in front of the school gate. Ibrahim Ridoy did not have any prior records of extreme violence, but under the influence of the crowd he still beat a helpless middle aged woman to death. This is surely unusual and also a point to be noted.

On the other hand, the blame does not rest entirely on the public for the upsurge in mob violence in recent times. It is important to take a evaluative look at the current justice delivery system of Bangladesh. It is evident that mistrust and lack of confidence in the judicial system of the country are one of the reasons that the public is choosing to lean towards mob justice.

A high increase in mob justice is directly related to the increased crime rate and slow trial process of cases in the courts. The recent upsurge of sexual violence and their sluggish trial process is a key factor which led the public to rely more on the quick and efficient mob justice. The emergence of the vigilante ‘Hercules’, who delivered a speedy execution of the criminals might have played a part it this as well. This is so because when people feel insecure because of crime, for example rape; they will defend and protect themselves by turning to violent acts of instant justice. Here people’s ignorance of the law could also implicate them into mob violence.

The people of Bangladesh needs to be made aware of the fact that this country has an adversarial criminal justice system in which an accused or offender is presumed innocent until proven guilty by a court of competent jurisdiction. Mob justice denies the victims a fundamental right to a fair trial. Hence it goes against the law of Bangladesh.

In conclusion, at least for the moment, there seems to be no better alternative to raising public awareness of the various laws regarding the mob lynching, as well as ensuring a speedy trial in the court to get rid of this plague and also to prevent it from ever coming back in the future.

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