Islamization in Bangladesh<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

by Fatemolla

 

Bangladesh emerged as a paragon of religious harmony in 1971 after a bloody battle with the Pakistani occupying army, which was guilty of massive genocide and rape. But after the continuous failures of consecutive, corrupt secular democratic governments over the last three decades, people became increasingly desperate for an alternative. The Jamaat-i-Islami, (the main Islamic political party, which had joined the Pakistani army in 1971 in killing and raping their own people), came forward to fill the gap, with their proposition of establishing a Sharia-based Islamic state. Today, Bangladesh, a country of 130 million people, of which 86% are Muslims, is proceeding rapidly towards Islamization. Jamaat and other Islamist elements effectively implemented several carefully prepared plans, including the following:

 

1. Thousands of their supporters are absorbed into the civil service and the Defense Force through a separate education system in 60,000 Islamic schools (madrasas), many of which are privately funded and offer free food and boarding. In most of these madrasas, the national anthem is never sung.

 

2. They have their own student wing, newspapers and other media which they use effectively, exploiting people’s religious sentiment to launch huge processions and to harass and torture freethinkers, journalists, writers, intellectuals, and any other opposition. With two ministers in the present parliament and thousands of suicidal followers, political Islam continuously hunts freethinkers by every means. Freedom of opinion is shrinking in Bangladesh.

 

3. They sent jihadi fighters to support the Taliban in Afghanistan, arranged arms training, smuggled firearms into the country and created training camps inside Bangladesh.

 

4. As political Islam does not recognize regional culture, it constantly attacks Bengali cultural activists and activities, and tries to implement so-called Islamic culture. It denies fine arts such as music, painting, dance and even the celebration of the New Year. Examples are the assaults on Taslima Nasrin and the planting of bombs in packed cultural gatherings and cinema halls. Muslims from other sects are also targets, and Ahmadi Muslims have been bombed in their mosques.

 

Perhaps the most serious and painful development in the Islamization of Bangladesh is reflected in the uncontrolled illegal, parallel judiciary system of instant summary Sharia courts that now hold sway in its villages. These summary courts dispense brutal and crude punishments, especially on women, for example burying waist-deep and stoning, beating with brooms and with shoes, shaving heads, flogging women and their parents, forcing them to walk with shoes around their neck, and so on. Performed as they are in the name of ‘God’s Law’, people tend to deny these obvious cruelties. Here are some real cases:

 

 18 May, 1993. Nurjahan of Faridpur district, accused of eloping with a man, was burnt to death.

 

10 January, 1993. The Sharia-court declared the divorce letter of another Nurjahan, of Sylhet District, a fake and her new marriage invalid. The new couple was punished for adultery by being buried waist-deep and stoned; her parents were flogged 100 times. Nurjahan committed suicide next day.

 

6 March 2002. In Chandaikona, two raped sisters aged 10 and 12 years were each flogged 101 times by the Sharia court. At one point the elder sister lay on the ground unconscious. The rapist could not be identified.

 

30 June 2002. In Sirajganj, Jaygun Bibi was abducted and raped for 12 days. The Sharia court flogged her and the rapist 80 times.

 

Islamist influence in the villages impacts directly on women’s economic freedom and democratic rights. Sharia courts have declared women divorced for taking jobs with non-governmental organizations and millions of women have been barred by Sharia from voting in elections.

 

Although Bangladesh has its own civil laws, certain Sharia laws are always observed such as women inheriting only half of any property, the right of men to have four wives, the right of men to divorce any wife and marry again to keep the number of wives at four at any time and restrictions on the right of women to divorce.

 

With each passing day Islamic law is steadily engulfing people’s minds and behaviour in Bangladesh. There is hardly any effort to address the atrocities of Sharia by the government. Despite the fact that both head of state and leader of the main opposition political party are female, nothing has been done to improve the situation of the country’s women. It is clear that these women leaders are as much representatives of patriarchy as their male colleagues.

 

Bangladesh is highly dependent on foreign aid. It seems that the only way to address the negative impact of the Islamization of Bangladesh is to put pressure on the Bangladeshi government through financial donor agencies such as the IMF, World Bank and donor countries.

 

fatemolla@hotmail.com