As West Bengal starts to become WestBangladesh, time toremember howBangladesh was formedto realize the goals of Lahore Resolution

https://www.opindia.com/2022/01/bangladesh-was-formed-to-realizethe-goals-of-the-lahore-resolutionof-1940/
The ruling paparty of West Bengal is popularizing the ‘Joy Bangla’ slogan to transform West Bengal into West
Bangladesh to make their vote bankhappy

30 January, 2022
Guest Author
Fifty years of the formation of Bangladesh is being celebrated quite enthusiastically in West Bengal. The spiritual bond of the Bengali language and culture between two Bengals is being rediscovered and championed. Bengali language movement of 1952 by the students at Dhaka University is also almost universally being accepted as th basis of the Bangladesh independence movement. The creation of Bangladesh is being portrayed as the emergence of a secular space on the eastern border of India. At this juncture, it is very important to expose this lie on the fiftieth anniversary of the formation of Bangladesh

Whenever the word Pakistan is uttered, a negative picture of a strict Islamic country emerges. When East Pakistan became Bangladesh, most people felt relieved that there would be no Pakistan on our eastern border. There was hope in West Bengal that it would no more be plagued with the constant influx of Hindu refugees from IslamicEast Pakistan. And ‘secular’ Hindu Bengali historians, artists, intellectuals, political parties (even some Hindutva activists) painted a rosy sentimental picture about the newly formed country called Bangladesh. But if we turn the page a little back, we will see that even after the partition of the country into Pakistan, the eastern wing of Pakistan
was called East Bengal. In 1955 it was officially named East Pakistan. The name Pakistan (meaning Holy Land)was coined by Chowdhury Rahmat Ali after the names of the states of Punjab,Afghanistan, Kashmir, Sindh, and Baluchistan. There was no mention of Bengal in it. There is no mention of the word Pakistan inthe Lahore resolution of 1940 which is considered as the basis and fundamental guide for creation of Pakistan. The Lahore resolution explicitly mentioned that “that the areas in whichthe Muslims are numerically in a majority as in the North-Western and Eastern Zones of India, should be grouped to constitute“Independent States” in which the constituent units shall be autonomous and sovereign”.Eminent writer and political leader of East Pakistan/Bangladesh,Abul Mansur Ahmed has explained it very clearly in his autobiographical book – “One Pakistan has been replaced by two Pakistans in accordance with Lahore Resolution. The Government of
India has assisted us in implementing the Lahore Resolution …. The Lahore resolution does not mention the word “Pakistan”, only the Muslim majority states. This means that the name of the states should be decided by the people later. The western people have named their state ‘Pakistan’. We, Easterners have named ours ‘Bangladesh’.

There is no reason to be confused. ” (Amar Dekha Rajnitir Panchash Bachhar [Fifty Years of Politics As ISaw It] –pp. 808 3rd Ed. by Abul Mansur Ahmed, Naoroj Kitabistan, Dhaka, 1975).East Bengal and West Bengal were
formed on 20 June 1947 by a vote in the Bengal Legislative Assembly.All the Muslim members of the Bengal Legislative Assembly were against the division of Bengal and voted in favour of annexing the whole of Bengal to Pakistan. Those Muslim members demanded a united Bengal not to protect the language and culture of Bengal but to gain control over a larger landmass including the rich and prosperous city of Calcutta. Two most prominent political leaders in favourof a united Muslim-majority independent Bengal were Shaheed Suhrawardy and Sarat Chandra Bose. Muslim Leaguer Shaheed Suhrawardy was then Primer of Bengal and also infamous as‘butcher of Calcutta’ because of his role in Great Calcutta Killings. Congressman Sarat Chandra Bose was the brother of
Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose. Debates on the status of the Bengali language in Pakistan started from the time of the creation of Pakistan. Was it due to love for Bengali language and culture? After the partition of the
country, all the Bengali newspapers published in East Bengal and who spoke in favour of the Bengalilanguage had Arabic names –Paygam, Dainik Azad, Ittefaq, Insan, Insaf etc. The name of the most important organization championing Bengali language was Tamaddun Majlis. This is an Islamic example oflove for the Bengali language.Bengali-speaking Muslims still name their children in Arabic.On 23 February 1948, Dhirendranath Dutta, leader of Congress Party in in the Constituent Assembly of Pakistan demanded that Bengali be made the state language. He was supported by three Hindu members namely Premahari Barman, Bhupendra Kumar Dutta and Srishchandra Chattopadhyay. Prime Minister Liaquat Khan (elected from East Bengal) and Chief Minister of East Bengal Khwaja Nizamuddin vehemently opposed it. No Muslim member of East Bengal supported this demand. However, shortly the movement to make Bengali the state language was intensified due to economic
reason.In the words of Abul Mansur Ahmed, “If Urdu is made the state language, the educated society of East Pakistan will become‘uneducated’ and ‘unfit’ for government service overnight. By replacing Persian with English as the state language in the midnineteenth century, British imperialism made the Muslim educated society “uneducated” and incapable of public service overnight.” (Purba Banglar Bhasa Andolan O Tatkaleen Rajnity
[Language Movement of East Bengal and Politics of that Time]vol , pp 19 b Badaruddin Umar, Anandadhara Prakashan, Dhaka, 1970).This was the crude reality of the Bengali language movement. Of
course, the students at Dhaka University and a section of intellectuals added some emotional components associated with mother tongue. But love for mother tongue was not absolute. In an article published in December 1948, the eminent linguist and scholar Muhammad Shahidullah wrote: “Language of religion has the place next to
mother tongue. For this, I will say with all my heart, like Bangla we want Arabic. The birth of the state of Pakistan will be meaningful on the day when Arabic will be accepted as the state language of the whole of Pakistan”. (Pakistaner Rashtrabhasa Samasya [Problem of State Language of Pakistan], Dainik Azad, 29 July, 1947). The
process of the Arabization of the Bengali language has been going on since then. In 1954, Bengali became the state language of Pakistan. In all official notifications from currency notes to postage stamps Bengali was
used along with Urdu. The language movement was over. But this victory of the Bengali language did not affect the ongoing persecution of Bengali speaking Hindus in East Bengal / East
Pakistan. It continued as usual. In 1950, during the language movement, Jogendranath Mandal, the law minister of Pakistan, a leader of the Scheduled Caste Society, a supporter of the Pakistanmovement, fled to India to save his life. In this context, another myth about the sacrifices of Bengali speaking Muslims only for the Bengali language needs to be demolished. It is true that in 1952 police fired on agitating students at Dhaka University and four Bengali speaking Muslims (none of them were students at Dhaka University) were killed. But ‘secular’ intellectuals of both the Bengals consciously ignored the sacrifices of eleven Hindu Bengalis in the Bengali language movement in Silchar, Assam in 1961. Out of eleven martyrs nine were Hindu refugees from East Pakistan including a young girl named Kamala Bhattacharya. So Bengali speaking Hindus never had any mercy from the Bengali speaking Islamists in East Pakistan/ Bangladesh. Since the creation of Pakistan, almost all the political parties of East
Bengal/ East Pakistan had complained against discrimination by West Pakistan in all facets of life– jobs, education, industry, agricultlture, trade. The first democratic election of East Bengal (not yet East Pakistan) was held in 1954. The United Front which won the election massively, was composed of four political parties ofEast Bengal, namely Awami Muslim League (later Awami League), KrishakShramik Party, Nezam-eIslam and Ganatantrik Dal. The United front announced 21-pointpackage programme in the electionmanifesto, drafted by Abul Mansur Ahmed of Awami Muslim League.The 19th point of the programme was– “The Lahore Resolution proposed full autonomy of East Bengal leaving defence, foreign affairs and currency only under the central
government. In the matter of defence, arrangements shall be made to set the headquarters of the army in
West Pakistan and the naval headquarters in East Bengal and to establish ordnance factories in East
Bengal, and to transform Ansar force into a full-fledged militia equipped with arms”. However, the United
Front government did not last long.After a long period of military rule, a general election of Pakistanwas held in 1970. Awami League under the leadership of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman won almost all the seats in East Pakistan and claimed to be invited to form the government. The basis of this huge election victory of Awami League was the six-point charter of demands framed in 1966.The first sentence of the first paragraph of the charter was, “Pakistan must be built into a true federation based on the historic Lahore resolution.” In other words, the Awami League had never deviated from the raison d’etre of creation of Pakistan. The six-point demands were all about East Pakistan’s economic issues. The last demand was the formation of an armed force for the security of East Pakistan (from Indian invasion). There was no mention of Bengali language and culture in the charter.The military government of Pakistan and the major political partiesof West Pakistan did not accept this victory of the Awami League and the following military intervention compelled Awami League todemand total separation from Pakistan. A so-called liberation war (MuktiYuddha) began. Historically such liberation wars go on for years and decades. Here, only nine months later, with a 14-day Indian military intervention gave birth to a new country – Bangladesh.Politically, Bangladesh became a newly independent country with anew secular constitution. But, shortly within three years, Bangladesh rolled back to the old mould of Pakistan. The secular constitution was scrapped, Islam was made the state religion. The opening words‘bismillah-ar-rahman-arrahim’ (In the name of Allah, the Beneficent,the Merciful), were added in 1997. Following the tradition of Pakistan, persecution of Hindus continued and at least ten million Bengali Hindus had been kicked out from Bangladesh in the last 50
years. How are the Bengali Hindus Living there? After the attack on idols,temple vandalism and attacks on the Hindu community across Bangladesh during Durga Puja last October, 2021, prominent Bangladeshi educationist and writer Muhammad Zafar Iqbal (brother of the legendary writer Humayun Ahmed) wrote in one of his social
media posts on October 19, 2021, “for last few days I am feelingmyself impure. It seems that I am immersed in a dirty sewer. Not only me, but many people like me in this country have the samefeeling, it seems that a large part of the nation is drowning indepression. The reason must be understood by everyone. Durga Puja, which is considered to be the biggest festival of Hindus, is at thecenter of the biggest violence this time. I can’t even comfort myself that this is an isolated incident. Starting from Comilla, it did not stop in Comilla, it spread all over the country. Which means there arehorrible communal people all over the country, they are not hiding, they are open in public, proudly carrying out their operation. …
..When the time for Durga Puja comes, the work of making idols starts all over the country, since then
I feel a kind of suppressed unrest inside myself. Inevitably I get the news that the idols are being
smashed here and there in the country. When the puja starts, I hold
my breath”. Do you find any difference between Bangladesh and (East) Pakistan? Famous Bengali writer and thinker Annadashankar Roy wrote – (duringa visit of Dhaka after formation of
Bangladesh) “We asked Sheikh(Mujibar) Saheb, ‘When did the idea of Bangladesh come to your mind?’ – He smiled and said, in 1947. I was a part of the team of Mr.Suhrawardy (then Prime Minister of United Bengal under British rule and known as ‘Butcher of Calcutta” for his alleged role in riot in Calcutta).He and Sarat Chandra Bose (brother of Netaji Subhash) wanted UnitedBengal. I (Mujib) also wanted acountry for all Bengalis. ” (Indrapat,
Kando Priyo Desh, Kolkata, 1979,Quoted in Bangabandhu Kibhbe Amader Swadhinata Enechhilen [How Bangabadhu Gave Us Independence] pp15 by Muntasir Mamun, Maola Brothers, Dhaka,2013)Do the people of West Bengal smell anything? The slogan of ‘Joy Bangla’, very popular iin Bangladesh, is nowadays being heard in the streets of West Bengal too. The ruling party of the state is popularizing this slogan to transform West Bengal into West Bangladesh to make their vote bank happy. In the fiftieth year of the formation of Bangladesh, the heirs of Sarat Chandra Bose and Suhrawardy are again dreaming of merging Hindu majority West Bengal into Islamic
Bangladesh to fulfil the spirit of Lahore resolution. Even Hindutva activists have now become Gandhites and care less about these ‘communal’ issues. Now it is time to wait for West Bengal to become West Bangladesh.
Author- Mohit Ray The author is a well-known environmentalist, refugee rights activist and state committee member of BJP in West Bengal. He has authoreda number of books on the environment and Bangladesh issues .

Bangladesh, democracy, and minorities, TIMES OF INDIA, World

December 13, 2021, Jitendra K Tuli in World/India Politics, World, TOI

J.K. Tuli was an advisor to former Prime Minister Atal Behari
Vajpayee.
Since its creation in 1947 as a part of Pakistan, Bangladesh (“BD”) has been a disaster for Democracy and minorities, primarily Hindus. When BD, with the help of India and Hindus, achieved independence from Pakistan in 1971, and Banga Bandhu Shaikh Mujibar Rehman became the first Prime Minister of independent BD,everyone hoped that BD would become a truly Democratic Country with equal rights for its minorities. However, Mr. Rehman dashed both the expectations. First, his government continued to treat minorities the way they were treated during Pakistan’s rule. Then he converted BD into an authoritarian government. In 1947, based on religion, Britishers partitioned India into two countries, India with Hindu majority and Pakistan, a Muslim majority country. Britishers created a strange country Pakistan with two parts – West Pakistan and East Pakistan. Both parts were about 1,000 miles apart with nothing in commons except religion. East Pakistan was populated by Bengalis. Even though East Pakistan had a majority in Pakistan, it was always ruled by West Pakistan which
exploited East Pakistan’s resources and in return West Pakistan kept East Pakistan poor and backward. In December 1971, Indian army, with some help of Bangladesh freedom fighters, attacked Bangladesh and on December 16, 1971, Pakistan’s army surrendered. A new constitution was installed in1972 and the first Parliament
election was held in 1973. The Awami League easily won the election. In 1975, Mr. Rehman imposed one Party rule. On August 15, 1975, Mr. Rehman was assassinated. In 1977, Army Chief Zia-ul Rahman staged a coup and
became President. In 1979, Parliament elections were held and the Bangladesh National Party (“BNP”) of General Rehman won the election. In 1981, General Rehman was assassinated and General Abadus Sattar became the President. In 1982, another military coup took place and the Chief Justice Chaudhary was installed as the
President by the army. In 1983, General Ershad became the President. He and his party, Jatiya Party remained in power until 1990 when General Ershad was forced to resign as a result of massive protestsin Bangladesh. In 1991 elections were held and BNP’s Begum Khalida Zia became Prime Minister. In June 1996, new elections were held and Awami League won. Shaikh Hasina, the wife of Mujibar Rehman, became the Prime Minister. In 2001, BNP won the elections and Begum Ziaagain became the Prime Minister. In 2008, elections were held and Awami League won more than a two-third majority and Ms. Hasina became the PM.The next parliamentary elections were scheduled to be held on January 24, 2014. As Shaikh Hasina’s government had become very unpopular, in all probability, she would have badly lost the elections. Out of this fear, the Awami League’s two-third majority changed the Constitution and eliminated the provision of a caretaker government. The government also arrested a number of opposition leaders. BNP and its allies reacted vigorously against the decision of not forming a caretaker government. BNP boycotted the 2013 elections. Awami League won a huge majority with a few seats
going to Jatiya Party. In order to have a facade of democracy, Mrs. Hasina did an unusual thing. She recognized the Jatiya Party as an opposition party in spite of the fact that the Jatiya Party did not have the number of Parliament Members required to be a recognized opposition. She also incorporated a couple of Jatiya Party Members of Parliament into her cabinet. Thus, Jatiya Party is an oppositionparty as well as a part of the government. Now the more serious question! The head of the Jatiya Party,Roxana Ershad, is old and would not be able to lead the party for too long and slowly, the Party may almost disappear. Both Shaikh Hasina and Khalida Begum are also old and their sons are corrupt and may not be able to lead their parties. This situation would cause a great political vacuum which may be filled by the Army, China, and radical Muslims. It is very important for India, the United States and Western Countries to get more engaged with BD and other South Asian countries and assure the survival of democratic systems so thatthey continue to act independently and not be fully dependent on and controlled by China as is the case of Pakistan. In spite of the support of India and Hindus, the BD government had been mostly undemocratic and anti-minorities, especially Hindus. Hindu properties, temples and businesses have been systematically destroyed and looted. Hindus have been killed and Hindu women have been raped regularly. The Islamic fundamentalists, along with the goons of all the political parties including the Awami League, continued atrocities against Hindus. No one, not even so called India’s friends Mujibar Rahman
and Shaikh Hasina tried to stop these atrocities against Hindus. Unfortunately, as usual, Hindus in BD either look towards India for help or migrated out of BD generally to India. They did not unite to protect themselves and create the vote bank and continued to suffer cowardly. However worse, all the Indian political parties and
governments, including BJP and NDA governments, did not say much against the murder of democracy and atrocities against Hindus in BD. Only RSS and VHP would occasionally denounce atrocities against Hindus.
Fortunately, I happened to meet two Moshi brothers, young BD Muslims from an influential family. They invited me to visit BD which I visited three times. My first visit was in January 2001. The Moshi brothers arranged my meetings with top politicians in BD and Hindu organizations. One young Indian attorney, Arbind Ghosh met me who was very active in protecting Hindus in BD. I learned thatPakistan had implemented Enemy Property Act in BD which was changed to Vested Property Act by Mr. Rahman. Under this Act, Hindus’ properties were confiscated by the government on some pretext and flimsy grounds. About 1.2 million acres of Hindu land and
properties worth crores of Rupees have been confiscated by the various BD governments. During my visit in 2001, I met Shaikh Hasina’s principal advisor. That visit was supported by then PM Vajpayee,
whom I had known since 1951. During my discussion with the Principal Advisor, I insisted upon the withdrawal of the Enemy (Vested) Property Act. Fortunately, at that time, my classmate and next door neighbor Vijay Kelkar at the University of California, Berkeley, ex-Finance Minister, was also in Dacca. He was visiting Dacca as the Director South Asia, International Monetary Fund. He also emphasized upon the BD government to accept my
recommendation. The government agreed to do so. To my knowledge, since then no property, under that act, has been confiscated, however, no property, confiscated earlier, hasbeen returned.During my second visit in 2014, I
went to Chittagong where there are many Hindu businessmen who are financially well to do. I urged them to help Hindu organizations in their efforts to protect Hindus. In Dacca, a group of Hindu youths came to see me at my hotel. One of them said,“All these old Hindus are retired; do not want to disturb things and would not do anything except talk. I urged them to take a lead and becomeactive at the colleges and universities they attend and work jointly to protect both Hindu causes and safeguard democracy. One evening a delegation of Buddhists and Christians also came to see me along with Mr. Ghosh. They also complained about atrocities committed against them. Then we all decided that Mr. Ghosh, with others, would form Hindu, Christian, Buddhist Minority (HCBM) organization to protect the civil rights of all minorities. The Moshi brothers also organized my meetings with the BNP leaders. At that time, BNP was completely demoralized. Awami League has a good relationship with the Congress Party and BJP. The Indian High Commissioners in BD have been totally under the control of left
leaning bureaucrats who did not care about Hindus in BD. BNP wanted to establish contact with BJP an Iarranged a meeting of a BNP leader with BJP when she visited India. I also got a promise from BNP leaders that if they came back to power, there would be at least two Hindu Cabinet Ministers. When PM Modi visited Dacca, I
arranged his meeting with Khalida Begum in spite of a strong opposition from the Awami League government. The meeting lasted for about 2 hours. I encouraged BNP leaders to start a nationwide movement for theprotection of democracy in BD. However, the BNP has completely surrendered and Shaikh Hasina has become a virtual dictator. During my third visit to BD, Hindu youths decided to form Hindu Maha Jot Sangha which started Shakhas similar to the RSS Shakhas in India. Now there are fourteen Shakhas in BD which are not significant enough to fully protect Hindus. I should also point out that a number of Muslim leaders in BD support Hindus. During my visits, I was invited for lunch by Maulana Bahaudin, who runs thousands of Madrassahas. I was also invited for breakfast by the head Imam at the biggest Madrasa in Dacca which was attended by about one dozen maulavis. All meals were vegetarian. They all support and help Hindus. There are a number of BD Muslim human right activists in BD and in the USA who support the rights of minorities in BD.Recently, Awami League goons with Rohingya refugees attacked Hindus, looted their belongings, and destroyed temples. I urged RSS, Dr. Subrahmanyam Swamy and Bangladeshi Hindus in the USA to take appropriate actions condemning the atrocities against Hindus. The RSS passed a resolution urging the BD government to take strong actions against those committing atrocities against Hindus. Dr. Swamy met the BD High Commissioner in Delhi who
assured the BD government’s strong action against the culprits.Hindus held demonstrations in New York and Washington, DC. It seems things have cooled down in BD. I have been urging Hindu and Muslim youths of BD to get politically active for a strong democratic system assuring the protection of the rights of all citizens. A democratic system will not be good only for a strong and prosperous BD, it will be good for a mutually beneficial
relationship between India andBD. It will also enhance BD’s global reputation. Hopefully, PM  Shaikh Hasina after achievingsignificant economic progress of BD, will leave a legacy by the return to democracy and protection of  minorities.

Only 1.93% allotted for religious minorities!

Bangladesh fiscal year 2021-22 budget allotted for Religious Affairs Ministry Taka 15,054.03 crore (roughly $1771 million) under the ADP (annual development project),of which Taka 290.08 crore (roughly $34million) was allocated for projects related to religious minorities. Religious minorities’ share of the religious affairs ministry’s total budget is only 1.93% and the rest goes to Islamic development, whereas the total religious minority population is more than 12%