Remember the iconic and often said dialogue of Tyrion Lannister from ‘Game of Thrones’? “A Lannister always pays his debts”- well may be, but Bangladeshis surely do. They are pretty much sincere about paying their debts.

Today the fourth and the biggest installment of the reparations to their debts to the sacred blood of the liberation war martyrs has been paid off.

Notorious, and of course brazenly arrogant, war criminals Salauddin Quader Chowdhury and Ali Ahsan Mohammad Mojaheed walked to the gallows together on 22 November  at 12:55am, which was indeed a happy and mind satiating moment for the Bangladeshi people, who are undeniably indebted to the 1971 Independence War martyrs.

This debt, however, is not for their sacrifices that made us freemen of a free country, and we can never possibly think of repaying that debt in the first place. For the precious lives of 3 million brave souls, the honour of 2 lakh mothers and sisters, and the horrific plight and great sacrifices of yet more hundreds of thousands of people go beyond our human capability to pay back. All we can do is to remember them with honour, praise and glorify them, and to uphold the dignity of the independence that is a gift for us from them. Unfortunately, exactly here at this very point we became indebted to our most noble souls.

How could men like Salauddin and Mojaheed rise to power to become public representatives? How on earth could they and their anti-Bangladesh ideology prevail in a country the birth of which they tried to halt with all force? Who gave them the opportunity to roam on this sacred land with blood still dripping from their fangs? We did. My reader perhaps is thinking about other options in an attempt to blame the politics and politicians for this. But this is the truth. Face it, man, face it. If there is anyone to blame, it’s you, us.

Entrusted to the sincere care of us, the sole responsibility of the country’s betterment was, is and will be ours. The moment Salauddin, Mojaheed, Sayidee, Nizami, and other anti-liberation forces like them stepped inside the Parliament House of the Independent Bangladesh; right then we got deep into debt to the martyrs who sacrificed their lives to present us this free country expecting that we would care for it. We can’t deny our responsibility. So, the debt was high with already 44 years gone by.

But, it’s better late than never. Finally the people of Bangladesh have started to pay their debts off. Today’s executions of two war criminals at the same time were a big leap towards the reparations to our heroes. We have already taken care of other two earlier and confidently expect to clear the entire debt off soon.