Hang in there, Dhaka
Because we don’t know what else to tell you…
Dhaka has been under a silent siege for many years now. But no one seemed to care as long as the cheap labour for our branded clothes was in abundant supply. A population failed multiple times by the powers that be and thus, ripe for brainwashing by religious fanatics… a power fueled Middle East entity which saw the opportunity and has been pouring millions of dollars that are unaccounted for and that go straight at the roots of extremism to nurture it into the monstrous being it has become today… a political landscape which hasn’t been able to shake off the ghosts of 1971 and the ensuing one-upmanship that has resulted in many politically motivated murders by the state… Bangladesh is a nightmare of a country right now.
India’s dealings with Bangladesh have always had more than a hint of high handedness. Relationships with Pakistan, and by extension, China could never gather any mileage at all, understandably so. It is too small and inconsequential a country to really matter for anyone else.
Given how this country birthed, the sowing of the seeds of liberalism in the initial stages was hardly a surprise. What has surely been something to stand up and take note of is how these liberal voices managed to retain their niche even after the poisoning of the collective psyche of the nation was well on its way. There have so many atheists, anti — religion, anti — fanaticism voices that have been silenced in the past few years that it isn’t even news anymore. To add to that, minorities have been treated despicably and that has led to a mass exodus of those entities from the landscape. After the sidelining and then targeting they have been subject to, this outage of sorts was only a matter of formality, a repetition of what happened in 1971 too.
Some would dismiss it as a probable case of a nation’s growth pangs but that would be blatant oversimplification. Yes, there are still traces of unease about what should the Constitution of the country say about its religious affiliation — Islamic or not. But given the foreign factors at play at the grassroots in the entire country and the rise of the right wing across the world, Bangladesh needs to find its feet soon. It’s cricket team has surely come of age in many ways and it’s time the country did too.
Politics based on religion can only go so far. It’s time for something better to emerge… something not based on revenge, something not based on futile attempts at righting the wrongs of the past, something based on hope.
Amen!
