Cricketers speak out in the martyr’s farewell to Osman HadiSharif Osman Hadi, a frontline fighter of the July mass uprising and spokesperson of the Inqilab Mancha, is no more. He breathed his last on Thursday night (18 December) at around 9:45 pm while undergoing treatment at a hospital in Singapore. Hadi had sustained critical head injuries after being shot by terrorists during an election campaign in Old Paltan in the capital on 12 December. After battling death for six consecutive days, this courageous young leader finally succumbed.He was laid to rest on Saturday (20 December) at 3:20 pm at the mausoleum complex of the National Poet Kazi Nazrul Islam at the University of Dhaka. In memory of Osman Hadi, a state mourning was observed across the country on Saturday. Millions of people gathered at Manik Mia Avenue in the capital for the funeral prayers of the martyred Hadi—an outpouring of emotion that also moved Bangladesh’s cricketers.In a Facebook post, national team star batsman Towhid Hridoy wrote:“The parliament complex that Hadi bhai was fighting to reach—he reached it after all. In heroic dignity, accompanied by thousands, drenched in the prayers and love of millions. Not everyone is blessed with so much love at the time of farewell. Allah had sent him to this world as a fortunate soul. May our Hadi bhai rest in peace in eternal sleep.”Former national team captain and current cricket board director Khaled Mahmud Pilot said he had never seen so many people at anyone’s funeral. National team pacer Ebadot Hossain Chowdhury wrote:“You were not a prime minister or a head of state. You were a good human being—known by everyone simply as a good person. That is why so many people came to your funeral today.”Another pacer, Rubel Hossain, wrote:“You have won, Hadi… Can any politician who has been in politics for years place a hand on their chest and say that when they die, people will come anywhere near in such numbers to their funeral or remember them like this? Politics should be for people’s rights, for the country. I say again—you have won, Hadi… You have shown the nation. May Allah grant you Jannatul Ferdous.”