Disturbing the Comfortable, Comforting the Disturbed

' 'Art should comfort the disturbed and disturb the comfortable," writes the

pseudonymous street artist Banksy—a sentiment that encapsulates the spirit of

On 16 July 2024, Abu Sayeed, an unarmed organizer of the students' rnovcment

for quota reform at Begum Rokeya University in Rangpur, was shot and killed

by police as he stood vsåth his arms stretched out, leaving his mother, Monowara

Begum, shell-shocked and crying, "My son only wanted a job; if you don't want

to give him a job, then don't—but why did you kill him?"

graffiti's defiance.

Since the 1960s, graffiti in

Bangladesh has served as a

powerful voice for resistance.

In 1966, student activists

spray-painted slogans like

"Down with Ayub Khan" on

walls, using graffiti as a covert

means of protest against a

repressive regime. When

military forces approached,

they

shouted

"chika!

chika!"—a word meaning

mole or muskrat— pretending

they were killing rodents to

disguise their actions. This

guerrilla tactic marked the

beginning of graffiti as a tool

of dissent in Bangladesh, and it

played a crucial role in the

Liberation War in 1971.

Noor Hossain, with the words "Down with Autocracy" ("hWF17 u$';

however, thc Bangla spelling for is - the misspelling underscoring

raw spontaneity of such expressions) boldly painted in bright white on his bare

chest, was photographed by Dinu Alam on 10 November. 1987. during a

pro-democracy protest in Dhaka. Shortly after, he was shot and killed by

Bangladesh Police.