Bangladesh may now be aptly called by its erstwhile name ‘East Pakistan.’ The fundamentalists poised to turn Bangladesh into an Islamic theocratic state have finally succeeded in toppling a democratically elected government, with the help of a military coup. Already, nations like the US, who champion and define democracy according to their convenience, have approved of the military coup as a people’s movement, for reasons not very much unknown.
However, for the Hindu minorities in Bangladesh, the concern is much more than ideological, political, or diplomatic arm-twisting. For them, the nights are marked by the uncertainty of life, property, and dignity. The temples and Hindu households have come under attack throughout Bangladesh since the protests backed by Jamatis intensified on Sunday. For the Hindus, the only concern now is to survive the onslaught.
Now as social media is flooding with narratives of the Madrasa students standing guard for the Hindu temples, the question persists, who are those then vandalizing and setting fire to the temples, and arriving in numbers of thousands. In the Sunday protest (August 4) alone, at least one Kali Mandir and one ISKCON temple were vandalized, with 2 Hindus killed, including a Hindu councillor. On Monday, after Hasina’s resignation, Hindu temples have been attacked in almost 15 different locations across Bangladesh, at the least. The list includes Durga, Kali, Krishna and Shiv temples of the districts of Chittagong, Feni, Rajshahi, Bogra, Pirojpur, Comilla, Pabna, Narsingdi, Barishal and a 200-year-old Kali Mandir of Moulvibazar which was torched on Monday. And even as I am writing this piece, the temples in Bangladesh are still under attack. Duttabhog Akhra was attacked a few minutes ago (11:30 P.M, August 6) in Narayanganj of Bangladesh, and another ISKCON mandir attacked in Meherpur of Bangladesh, in the evening hours of today (Tuesday). I guess the photo sessions of forming human chains around the temples are over, and the vandals are back to their business.
There is no iota of doubt that the Bangladesh nation is having its Iran revolution moment. The nation is walking the path of radicalism and fundamentalism, so much so that the statues of Sheikh Mujib have been dismantled, and the hooligans have even urinated on the broken head of Mujib’s statue. The ones justifying the act on social media claim that there is no space for idols in an Islamic nation. Some others have even argued that democracy has no place in an Islamic republic; they must only be ruled by Shariah. The so-called torch bearers of Democracy, the great student protestors, are picking up the undergarments of a lady of their mother’s age, their ex-PM, and displaying it as a prize of the theocratic movement they launched. Obviously, it is. A state built on the ideals of extreme Islamist ideas like that of ISIS had to meet this fate. A nation where a military coup is deemed as the victory of democracy and leaders serving jail terms for instigating violence against minorities are freed on an urgent basis by the military dictator government to unleash mayhem over the little surviving minority – explains what this entire fiasco was about, absolutely not for the quota controversy, which was already resolved by the Bangladesh Supreme Court.
There are ample signs to prove that Bangladesh is turning itself into a theocratic state and rewinding the clock to 1971 to undo the idea of a Bengali nation of Sheikh Mujib and rather establish what his contemporaries always wanted to, a nation that looks like a Waaz mehfil of any extremist Mullah, reciting dictates, calling for the expulsion of the entire Hindu community.
Reacting to the news of the killing of around 30+ police officials in a recent presumed-coordinated set of attacks, a Bangladeshi friend of mine, Krishna, stated and I quote, “After the killings, the Police officials are refusing to serve their duties in the streets, both due to fear and anguish. This has further pushed the vulnerable minorities to the risk of more attacks. We are hoping for a turnaround in the law-and-order situation, after the interim government takes charge.” How neutral or effective the interim government would be, in my opinion, is still doubtful though.
Another friend of mine, who was my co-volunteer in one of the internationally recognised NGOs, Fatima (name changed), states, “There are tensions ongoing, even though the Army is trying to settle things up. The violence was very much expected and it is sad but natural to see such political killings taking place, given the pretext of the recent killings that took place against the protestors during Hasina’s reign.”
With Hindu councillors and pupils on the receiving end of the brutal killings, the goal of theirs doesn’t seem to be a distant dream. The Hindu Buddhist Christian Unity Council counts the number of minority properties being attacked at 97. The numbers shared are of Monday and are expected to have risen exponentially as the violence continues to grip fresh localities. At least 100 got killed on Sunday, 134 on Monday, most of whom were from the Awami League and the minority communities, chiefly Hindus. The death toll on Tuesday stood at 29, all belonging to the ousted PM Sheikh Hasina’s Party. The definite head count of the number of Hindus killed till now is unknown, as it has always been in the case of Bangladesh. The Hindu population is on its own to face this pogrom, as we from India look from a safer distance, and some even sympathise and cheer for the sacrificial ceremony that has been organised to celebrate the creation of a lunatic state.