The assassination of a young activist taking his first steps in politics, Sharif Osman Hadi, is a tragic setback for the country, in more ways than one. To start with, he was shot a day after the announcement of the schedule for the 13th parliamentary election to be held next February 12 by the chief election commissioner- as such, it must be seen as a direct threat to what will be, by universal consent, the most important election in more than a generation. One that will have the eyes of the entire world watching intently, as the country seeks to finally transition back to a democratic dispensation.

On the other hand, it was a direct affront to the promise of the Uprising, through which we hoped to see a new generation of worthy leaders emerge to take the reins of Bangladesh. Osman Hadi was one such figure, trying to stake a claim in the future of the country. Despite being politically conscious throughout his young life, and joining the Jatiya Nagorik Committee that acted as a precursor to the National Citizen Party, or NCP, Hadi showed remarkable vision in devoting himself to fighting what the revolutionary generation terms, somewhat controversially, 'cultural fascism'. That is why he, with his great friend Abdullah Al Jaber, decided to form Inqilab Moncho, a cultural platform that took on the mission of inculcating the values underpinning the July Uprising in the way that we live - culture, Hadi understood, would always be upstream from politics. What we consume in the cultural sphere eventually influences the political choices we make, much more than the other way around.

Having said that, most of Inqilab Moncho's young activists were fiercely political as well, and a number of them ran (and won) in the much talked-about DUCSU election that we had last September, either as independents or as part of the Islamic Chaatra Shibir-backed panel that pretty much swept the polls. That may have spurred Hadi's own decision to run as an independent candidate in the coming election. His chosen constituency was Dhaka-8, that includes the part of Rampura where he lives.

Some have said it was this audacious decision to run in a constituency against one of the BNP's certified heavyweight candidates, Mirza Abbas, that turned him into a living, breathing target. And that the news of his death, that came six days after the assassin's bullet pierced his brain stem, was simply the culmination of a process set in motion from the day he announced he was running. But the police's investigation has revealed the far likelier culprit, and it is difficult at this point to see this assassination as anything other than one intended to directly disrupt the electoral process, while at the same time being an act of revenge for those who were the biggest losers from the Uprising.

It is also most unfortunate, that the destabilising potential of this killing has already been exploited by agent provocateurs with their own agenda, who incited a mob to attack two leading media houses, Daily Star and Prothom Alo, in the hours after his death was announced. The weeks and months ahead, till the election, will evidently be fraught with difficulty. But if we are to honour young Hadi in death, let us pledge to not let anything deter us.