When Faisal Mahmud, a reporter in Dhaka working with _Al Jazeera,_ reached a site of student protests around Dhaka University on July 17, he was met with hostility.  “They (the students) did

not let me inside the area at first, saying no journalist was allowed,” he said. “They let me in eventually after finding out where I work, but most other journalists were pushed away. The

anger against the media was very high. Seeing how the mainstream media covered the protest fermented their anger, giving them a common enemy and motivating them to be on the streets even

more.”  Students told Mahmud they felt “betrayed” by how they had been villainised by the media. News media in Bangladesh has been less of a pillar of democracy and more a political tool

Bangladesh saw periods of authoritarian rule, martial law and multiple political uprisings. Through all this, mainstream news media struggled to exercise its right to free speech. Although

towing the government line was standard practice for local media, press censorship became stronger than ever from 2015 onwards, under the Bangladesh Awami League leader (and Rahman’s

daughter), Sheikh Hasina.  Once hailed as a democratic icon, Hasina’s second premiership began in 2009 and was soon mired in corruption scandals, allegations of abuse of power, tyrannical

control over media, and state-sponsored violence. Her tenure ended when she fled the country on August 5 this year, after millions took to the streets in Dhaka to demand Prime Minister

Hasina’s resignation. Until the point when Hasina went into exile, most of mainstream media, particularly TV news, remained subservient to her.  “The Bangladeshi media has invariably been

deeply sodomised by the government,” said Sumon Rahman, professor of media studies at University of Liberal Arts Bangladesh. “There is no media. All the media houses are propaganda and

barring a couple, there are no variations. The ones that are independent cannot carry their voices that far and wide.” Over 15 journalists and editors confirmed to _Newslaundry _that it was

commonplace for officers from the Directorate General of Forces Intelligence (DGFI), Bangladesh’s Intelligence agency, to ring up editors of media houses with instructions on what should be

published and what should be censored.  The _Daily Star _and _Prothom Alo _are known to be the only independent newspapers in Bangladesh. They were declared an “enemy” of democracy and the

Bangladeshi people by Hasina. Reporters from these newspapers were barred from her office and public events. Hasina’s press conferences were infamous for being choreographed events that

allowed her to bask in tributes lavished upon her by attending journalists, who were cherry-picked by her supporters in mainstream media. Any questions Hasina received were usually framed in

a way that gave her an opportunity to criticise those in opposition. “It is a known fact that journalists who attend these press conferences [organised by the government] are partisan, but

in the last few years, the situation went beyond that,” said journalist Kamal Ahmed, who used to be an editor with _Prothom Alo_. “The press conferences were managed in such a way that she

[Hasina] got only favourable questions. But it went so far that the journalists stopped asking questions altogether. All they did was praise her or provoke her to attack opposing or

dissenting voices.” This could be seen in the way TV news and some prominent pro-Hasina newspapers covered the student protests that began in response to a decision announced by Bangladesh

High Court on June 5, to reintroduce a job quota that would reserve 30 percent of civil servant jobs for descendants of freedom fighters. Students from six universities started a peaceful

protest against the order, arguing that the quota would only serve the dominant Awami League.