This allegation was strengthened because of destruction of evidence by the authorities immediately after the assassination attempt, and also by the fact that the law enforcing authorities, who had earlier literally blanketed the area where the meeting took place, could not apprehend all of the killers.

So long it was believed that Harkatul Jihad (Huji), a terrorist organization banned by the Bangladesh government, was responsible for the assassination attempt on Sheikh Hasina.

But a press report from Guhwati, capital of the Indian state of Assam, saying that the Indian terrorist organization United Liberation Front for Assam (Ulfa) carried out the attack with the help of a few Bangladeshi intelligence officials, has put a new twist in the as yet unresolved mystery.

According to the report, Ulfa commander Pallav Saikia has confessed to the Indian authorities that 11 of his men who carried out the assassination attempt were assisted in planning the attack by a few Bangladeshi intelligence people who even provided them with vehicles in the morning of that fateful day.

This new twist in the yet unresolved murder attempt on Sheikh Hasina thickens the controversy in the light of the judicial confessions given by three Huji terrorists in 2005 that also implicated several absconding Bangladeshi criminals in this plot.

Questions have also been raised, like who plotted the assassination attempt, what was the motive behind the attack, who supplied the grenades used for the assassination attempt, how the same type of grenades were found later in Dhaka Central Jail, why the evidence was destroyed so quickly, and why two of the victims were buried so hurriedly.

The entire episode of August 21 reflects not only the criminalization of Bangladeshi politics but also the immunity that is enjoyed by the criminals who tried to kill a former prime minister and leader of the largest political party in the country.

If the involvement of intelligence officials is proved to be correct, then one cannot but wonder at the degenerative depth of politicization of the bureaucracy in the country.

The new chief advisor Dr. Fakhruddin Ahmed's call to the bureaucracy to consider themselves as servants of the people, and not to serve the interest of any political party, could not have been more timely.

But ambition, being an ingrained quality in human personality, molded by today's materialistic world, where the rat race is for not only keeping up with the Joneses but for living better than the Joneses, drives an individual's need for political patronage.

This is truer in developing countries where the cake is small and the rats for the race are many. Independence from Pakistani colonial rule has opened for us the materialistic and advanced world and, consequently, a raging desire to acquire as much material advancement as possible in the shortest possible time.

This soulless race for acquisition, often devoid of moral values, will be difficult to check as long as the political leaders do not set examples by their own lifestyle and behaviour, as is seen in some Scandinavian countries.

Prime Minister Olaf Palme was killed on his way back home by underground train after watching a movie, yet his successor refused police protection that could have saved the life of Anna Lindt, the Swedish foreign minister, many years later.

One could argue that, given the violent end of many leaders in South Asia, the Scandinavian example of refusal by state officials to avail themselves of police protection lest they lose contact with the people, is not tenable in our country, and more so if fear of assassination remains a constant companion.

German-born philosopher Hannah Arendt theorized that bureaucracy could be so developed that there would be no one left to argue with, as a totalitarian form of government would have taken over and the bureaucracy, divided in hierarchical order, would achieve its ends less through deliberations and more through regulations and orders.

This is true of the bureaucracy in many developing countries, particularly those that were colonized, because the metropolis-periphery relationship demanded that the orders received from the colonial masters were to be obeyed to the letter, regardless of the ill effects they may have on the colonized people.

In the case of the assassination attempt on Sheikh Hasina some bureaucrats appear to have been "colonized" mentally, either through voluntary indoctrination or because of expectation of monetary and/or professional benefits.

Though such indoctrinated people are few in number the affliction can be cancerous, and can lead to indiscipline in the bureaucracy with consequent inefficiency (and lethal plan to) physically eliminate political masters, duly elected by the people, at the direction of others.

Such subversion of the law, constitution and the democratic process has to be seriously dealt with. Theses are not simple murders affecting only a few, but have a much wider range with enveloping effects on state institutions.

Had the attempt on August 21, 2004 succeeded, Bangladesh could have been classified as a failed state. The world today, particularly after 9/11, is passing through a critical stage involving a possible civilizational conflict.

Former US secretary of state Madeline Albright's description of the shift in US foreign and defense policies after the Bush administration had taken over power from Bill Clinton as "tectonic" is indicative of the civilizational conflict currently raging in the world.

But then it is difficult to draw a causal relationship between the situation reigning in the world with that of August 21, 2004 carnage, unless one were to give serious credence to the claim initially made by Harkatul Jihad that they were responsible for the attack on Awami League leadership because of Awami League's advocacy of secularism and its fight against repression of Hindu minority community.

The latest revelations from Guhawati have to be seriously investigated so that the truth can be established once and for all. People will lose faith in our legal and law enforcement institutions, faith being already fragile, unless such high profile cases are brought to an end and justice is meted out to the culprits.

Kazi Anwarul Masud is a former Secretary and Ambassador.