How can freedom of speech flourish when sensitivities are so high, and public patience so low, when dissent is considered dangerous, any critique is considered to be a challenge, and all opposition is viewed as an existential threat that must be crushed? How credible are the preachy platitudes about democracy coming from people who are not its best exemplar?

An MP – who paradoxically represents the ruling coalition as well as its opposition in the parliament – recently played the proverbial role of the judge, jury and prosecutor.

Tehrik-e-Khatme Nabuwwat, an Islamist group, has come on the scene apparently to counter the public outrage over the humiliation of a Hindu schoolteacher in Narayanganj.