It was in the month of August, 77 years ago that India was partitioned. And a country called Pakistan was forcefully created. That too East Pakistan and West Pakistan, between which lay thousands of kilometres of India. The eastern part was named East Pakistan and the western part was named West Pakistan. Despite East Pakistan having a larger population than West Pakistan, people from West Pakistan have been occupying the highest positions in the country since 14 August. And despite East Pakistan having the highest number of parliamentarians in the 1970 elections, West Pakistan leader Zulfikar Ali Bhutto did not allow East Pakistan leader Sheikh Mujbur Rahman to become the Prime Minister. This has been the most shocking example of the Indian subcontinent of making a mockery of parliamentary democracy.
Due to which Pakistan got partition in 1947 on the dead bodies of 2 crore people! Before that, despite Bengali being the language of more than 90% of the people, Urdu was imposed on them! This issue was raised during the lifetime of Quaid-e-Azam Barrister Mohammad Ali Jina, and most surprisingly, due to his mistake of imposing it, unity could never be achieved in both the geographies! However, discontent continues in all the provinces of present Pakistan except Punjab province! In Baluchistan and Pakhtunistan, the process of separation has been going on for more than a hundred years since the time of the British! Pervez Musharraf himself has written in his autobiography that “Pakistani army and court are also ineffective in these regions! Both these regions do not accept Islamabad at all!” In a way, if we take stock of 77 years, then Pakistan is a failed state! The biggest example of its failure is that the entire East Pakistan became Bangladesh within twenty-five years! And just like Baluchistan and FATA (Federal Administrative Area, the new name of the old North-East Frontier), the situation is also the same in Swat Valley and POK! I have had the opportunity to visit Pakistan twice! And I have heard anti-Pakistan comments from the mouths of people from Baluchis to Swat, POK and Sindh provinces!
But as the ugly form of Hindu communalism has been seen in India for the last forty years! And day by day it is making more strides! So this is very suitable for the communal forces of Pakistan! And today Narendra Modi is more popular in Pakistan than any other Prime Minister! And it is natural that for a country which was created only on the basis of religion! The rise of communalism in India has given it even more strength! The naivety of Hindutvawadis is very useful for Pakistan! They have succeeded in creating Pakistan only by citing the majority population! So Hindu communalism in India is being used to justify the process of formation of Pakistan!
The same thing is about development, in comparison to West Pakistan, development of East Pakistan was ignored from the very beginning! And due to all these reasons, discontent kept on increasing in the part of East Pakistan! And due to the result of 1970 elections, the demand for separation from West Pakistan, mainly due to the stubborn stand of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, became stronger day by day! And even before 25 years of the formation of Pakistan, East Pakistan ended and came into existence on 16 December 1971 as Bangladesh!
In West Pakistan, within ten years of its separation from India, the military started dominating instead of democracy from 1956 to 1971. It started with General Ayub Khan, from 1977 to 1988 and from 1999 to 2008 and it is still continuing till now!
Although in between some politicians might have become Prime Minister or President through elections, but all of them remained helpless in front of the army. This is applicable to both the countries. These countries of the Indian subcontinent have been under the control of the army for more than half of the time since their formation. And the corruption of the army of both the countries is world famous. In Pakistan, from the Vice Chancellors of universities, to the chief officers of irrigation projects, even in the field of health care, the directors of big hospitals are from the army. Pakistan’s transport business, from freight to migrant transport, is in the hands of high-ranking officers who have retired from the army. This means that the army has the biggest share in Pakistan’s economic sector. And the most surprising thing is that it will be 77 years after the formation of Pakistan after one week from today. But due to the interference of the army in every sphere of life, the army has become a dominating force in comparison to the common Pakistani. Due to this, the concentration of wealth in Pakistan is in the hands of old landlords and newly rich retired army men. The middle class is almost non-existent. And the two classes that are prominently visible are the richest and the poorest.
Even though Bangladesh was formed in place of East Pakistan, but here also within five years, on 15th August 1975, the army killed Prime Minister Sheikh Mujbur Rahman and his entire family including small infants. (At that time Sheikh Hasina Wajed was in Germany, that is why she survived.) And since then the army took over. This means that democracy was murdered in the countries on both sides of India. And the army took over in both the countries.
Sheikh Hasina Wajed took refuge in India directly from Germany and stayed there till 1981 with the help of Mrs. Indira Gandhi. And she returned to Bangladesh after the situation in Bangladesh improved. She worked hard to bring Awami League back into active politics. And she succeeded in becoming the Prime Minister of Bangladesh for the first time in 1996. After that, she succeeded in becoming the Prime Minister five times from 2009 to January 2024. But blinded by the intoxication of power, she failed to take action against the opposition parties and to give the benefits of economic development of Bangladesh to the common people. And while there is more than forty percent unemployment, she decided to give almost the same percentage of reservation to the family members of the people involved during the formation of Bangladesh. Which made no sense. But due to the intoxication of power, and the mistake of considering their opponents as enemies, the common people who were born after 1971 are more troubled by the problem of their employment today than the independence of Bangladesh! The communal parties got this golden opportunity! And they succeeded in creating today’s situation! But Sheikh Hasina also made mistakes in handling this situation! And by calling the protesters Rajhakar and traitors, she added fuel to the fire! And in the end, she not only had to resign on August 5, but also had to leave the country!
And still since yesterday, the army has formed an interim government under its leadership! Khaleda Zia has been released from house arrest! (This lady is the widow of Bangladesh Army General Ziaur Rahman!) And Jamaat-e-Islami and Khaleda Zia are once again emerging in Bangladesh politics! Both of them are parties that practice extreme communal politics! And are against the minority communities living in Bangladesh! And the most worrying thing is that if the Bharatiya Janata Party gets political advantage by harassing the minority Hindus in Pakistan or Bangladesh, then it will not be possible for this party to remain in power in a multi-faceted country like India!
And I had the opportunity to visit Bangladesh in 2015 to attend the conference of the Asian Social Congress. And in that trip, apart from the Asian Social Congress, I made a special effort to take out some time to meet the Hindus living in Bangladesh and the Bihari Muslims who were stuck in limbo after 1971.
Today, Bihari Muslims are living in Jinwa Camp, a central area of Dhaka, in the absence of any kind of civic amenities and in a dilapidated condition. And they have not been given citizenship till now. Due to this, they do not get the benefit of government schemes. And there is no facility for doing jobs either. This population was ten thousand at the time of the formation of Bangladesh. Today it is more than one million. And I have seen them speaking in Bangla except their parents. Now they have become 100% Bengali. But the government had not given them citizenship till then. For which we have also advocated. We said that now it is going to be fifty years since the formation of Bangladesh. Their parents had left Bihar due to the appeal of General Ayub Khan and came to help in the creation of the new country. But within a few days of their arrival there, the movement for independent Bangladesh started. And Bangladesh was formed in 1971. And Pakistan failed to fulfill its promise.
I have seen camps of Kashmiri Pandits in and around Jammu, camps of Palestinians living in Lebanon, Syria and Gaza Strip. But Jinwa camp located in the middle of Dhaka is in the worst condition. There is no sanitation and no proper drinking water supply. And seeing the entire camp in a pile of garbage, I did not feel like eating or drinking anything despite staying there for a whole day.
After the formation of Bangladesh, even today more than one crore Hindus are living in Bangladesh! And most of them are living in Dhanmondi area of Dhaka! I was in that area for a whole day! There is an old temple of Dhakeshwari there! After which the city of Dhaka is named! There is also an office of Hindus of Bangladesh in the premises of the same temple! In which I got a chance to meet the officials! And they said that as long as Sheikh Hasina Wajed’s government is there, we are at peace! During the time of Khaleda Zia, we had to live in great fear! Meaning that some mistakes have definitely been made in Sheikh Hasina Wajed’s politics in Bangladesh! But regarding secularism, during her fifteen years of power, she has tried to keep the minority communities safe! This is a matter of concern for one crore Hindus living in Bangladesh today! The way the mob attacked and looted the Prime Minister’s residence yesterday! And the worst part is that along with stealing things from that house, they were protesting by holding women’s undergarments in their hands! Selected attacks have started on Awami League leaders! And to break the statues of Banga Bandhu Sheikh Mujbur Rahman, who built Bangladesh without caring for his own life, people are seen with cranes and bulldozers and some overenthusiastic youth are seen climbing on his statue and trying to break it with hammers! Exactly the same scene happened in Russia after Glasnot-Prestorika during 1989-90, with the statues of Karl Marx and Lenin in Russia, Poland and East Germany! And during the American attack in 2003, it happened with the statues of Saddam Hussein and his buildings in Iraq! Which is going on in Bangladesh since Sunday!
Subscribe to Our Newsletter
Get the latest CounterCurrents updates delivered straight to your inbox.
Similarly, I am worried that this uncontrolled mob can also start attacking Hindus living in Bangladesh. Because most of the Hindus have been supporters of Sheikh Hasina Wajed. And there is a high possibility of Islamic fundamentalists targeting them. There are reports of sporadic incidents in other parts of Bangladesh. But if this fire spreads and attacks happen on Hindus in other areas of Bangladesh, especially in Dhaka, then a very scary situation can arise. And Hindutva organizations of India can be overjoyed. Because the creation of Pakistan is the biggest issue for Hindutva organizations.
Well, as per the news till now, the army has also included a Hindu in the formation of the interim government! And the current army chief is the son-in-law of Sheikh Hasina Wajed’s cousin! And it is expected that he will be secular! And with the hope that he will provide adequate security to the Hindus living in Bangladesh!
Dr Suresh Khairnar is former president of Rashtra Sewa Dal (RSD)
