Abstract: The genesis of Islam reveals liberal and humanistic origin of Islam in East Bengal. But this liberal -humanistic Islam has turned in to "Political Islam" mainly due to three major regressive transformations of "Communalization of Islam" associated with the emergence of "religious doctrine-based Pakistan State" (in 1947), failure in punishing the 'war criminals' (in 1971 War of Independence), and legitimizing communalism by replacing `secularism' by "Islam as state religion" in the Constitution (eighth amendment 1988). The failure of the State in satisfying basic needs of the people (in line with Constitutional obligations), growing criminalization of economy and politics, growing inequality in society, increasing youth unemployment, communalization of culture and education, lack of people's confidence on mainstream political (democratic) leadership, external environment - all contributed to the growth of Islamist extremism in Bangladesh. Religious fundamentalism, in the process, has gained momentum to shape organized `political Islam', which intends to capture the state power by force. The religious fundamentalist forces have successfully assimilated the mythos of religion with logos of reality, and pursuing their aim of capturing the state power by using religion as pretext through an well organized economic power based political process. In so doing, the fundamentalists have created "an economy within the economy", and "a state within the state". Now they share political power (from local to central governments) and they have adequate economic strength (from micro to macro levels) to sustain their political organizations. The economics of fundamentalism, in the narrow sense of the term, can be explained in terms of enterprises ranging from large financial institutions to household level micro credit, from mosques and madrasas to news media and IT, from nation wide trading enterprises to local level NGOs. The estimated amount of annual net profit generated by these enterprises would be US$200 million. All these economic enterprises are run by ideologically motivated and professionally competent persons. At least 10% of their net profits are being used to finance political organization, which is sufficient to fund salary of 500,000 full timers in Islamic fundamentalist politics. Taking advantage of their economic as well as political power, they set their own representatives in key strategic positions in the government and autonomous bodies. The relative strength of economics of fundamentalism in Bangladesh can be traced in the fact that its annual net profit is equivalent to 6% of the government's annual development budget or about 4% of national export earnings, and the annual growth rate of the economy (7.5% - 9%), controlled by the fundamentalists, is higher than that of the national economy (4.5%-5%). Therefore, Islamist fundamentalism in Bangladesh, as a beleaguered tradition and embattled faith is a refusal of dialogue in globalizing world that asks for reasons and whose peace and continuity depend on it. The crisis, emanating from the economics of fundamentalism and politics of religious extremism, can be overcome only through enlightened political and civic movements guided by courageous leadership coupled with substantive public actions. Such actions should aim at giving an institutional shape to democratic values, secular mind-set, and equity in distribution of public resources and benefits of development.
Economics of Fundamentalism - Introduction and linkage
The term "fundamentalism" - as religions reaction against scientific and secular culture - may not be a perfect one, but it is a useful label for movements that, despite substantial differences, bear a strong family resemblance (Armstrong 2001). Fundamentalism is a controversial category, but an objective meaning can be given to it in line with the following: embattled faith; beleaguered tradition; withdrawal from mainstream; creation of counter culture; transformation of mythology in to ideology; cultivation of theologies of rage, resentment and revenge; refusal of dialogue necessary for peace and continuity; defending beleaguered tradition using ritual truth in globalizing world that asks for reasons (see box).
The economics of fundamentalism is relatively a new area of research not yet adequately defined in the political economy literature. This paper is not aimed at defining economics of fundamentalism per se as an independent economic system or an independent mode of production. The purpose here is to provide an analysis of the economic strengths of the religious fundamentalist forces in Bangladesh within a political economy framework. In accomplishing the analysis, the historical reason for substantive regression from "Humanistic Islam" into "Political Islam" in Bangladesh have been traced, and the essence of economic and social foundations for the emergence and growth of religious extremism and economics of fundamentalism have been identified. And finally, attempts have been made to understand the political limits to growth of economics of fundamentalism and associated religious-communal politics in Bangladesh. Therefore, this paper purports to provide an analysis in to the political economy of Islamist fundamentalism-cum religious extremism in Bangladesh
Economics of fundamentalism can be viewed as a concentrated expression of religion-based communal politics aimed at capturing the state power using religion as pretext. It runs contrary to secular approach to people, smothering and decimating the free, unfettered outlook. It has launched a vicious onslaught on the spirit of secularism that was embedded in the Constitution of the People's Republic of Bangladesh in 1972 following the Liberation War-1971. The act of satisfying people's hopes and aspirations turned out to be a fiasco. At the same time, erosion of a secular democratic mind-set also cropped up. Both these two factors, besides encouraging the growth of fundamentalism and its economic agents and interests, have given birth to the institutions that turned favorable to their expanded reproduction. Consequently, the economics of fundamentalism came in to being. | Objective meaning of fundamentalism Religious fundamentalism is a form of militant piety in religion. Fundamentalism is an embattled faith. It is beleaguered tradition defended in the traditional way - by reference to ritual truth - in a globalizing world that asks for reasons. Fundamentalism is evident in both great monotheisms (Christianity, Islam, Judaism) and in other religions (Buddhism, Hinduism, even in Confucianism etc). The Muslim and Jewish fundamentalisms are not much concerned with doctrine, which is an essentially Christian preoccupation. `Fundamentalisms' all follow a certain pattern - they are embattled forms of spirituality, which have emerged as a response to a perceived crisis. They are engaged in a conflict with enemies whose secularist policies and beliefs seem inimical to religion itself. Fundamentalists do not regard this battle as a conventional political struggle, but experience it as a cosmic war between the forces of good and evil. They fear annihilation, and try to fortify their beleaguered identity by means of a selective retrieval of certain doctrines and practices of the past. To avoid contamination, they often withdraw from mainstream society to create a counterculture, yet fundamentalists are not impractical dreamers. They have absorbed the pragmatic rationalism of modernity, and, under the guidance of charismatic leaders, they refine these "fundamentals" so as to create an ideology that provides the faithful with a plan of action. Fundamentalists - by turning the mythos of their religion into logos and by transforming their complex mythology into a streamlined ideology - cultivate theologies of rage, resentment, and revenge. Fundamentalism is a refusal of dialogue in a world whose peace and continuity depend on it |
The rise of socialism in the first half of the last century and its disintegration during the end of the century; economic crisis in the developed capitalist world; the aggressive attitude of imperialism and polarization of the world, and the rise of unjust globalization - all contributed to the growth of religion-based fundamentalism in the world. Imperialism has played a major part in the speedy rise of fundamentalism in some parts of the world. This might be evident, among others from the pertinent question: Who created Talebanism, Molla Omar, Bin Laden? The global communities find a subtle touch of irony as they bestow their concentration upon the fact that those rich and powerful countries, which want control over others, have not delayed describing such destructive elements as their enemy when their imperialistic interests are served. Here, the profit equation has acted as the key determinant. Where and how imperialism will play its role will depend on their own political economic equation with their self interest - where in ultimate analysis, economic considerations play the vital role. Capital will not hesitate to risk its life if there is a chance of 300% profit earning. Therefore, the rise of economics of fundamentalism is obvious, and such religious extremism is compatible with the evolution of free-market-mediated increasing alienation and crisis in identity. Likewise if certain form of fundamentalism turns out as an obstacle to the growth of imperialism, the same will be replaced by another form of communalism - this is also noticeable. In the present era, the political economy of oil and gas, geo-economics of water and oil, political economy of establishing command over the global market (in the name of so called free market and globalization) - these are some of the broad areas of bondages between fundamentalism and imperialism. Both external and internal elements of fundamentalism give rise to parochialism against religious liberalism. On the one hand, the crisis of dollar economics 1, the sharp growth of petro dollar in the world economy and its volatility, the attack of Soviet Union on Afghanistan, the barbarian 9/11 and subsequent over-reaction by the name of "attack on terrorism", doubt and mistrust in people carrying Muslim name in the developed world, the war against Iraq 2- the second largest reservoir of oil in the world and occupation of the country, the spread of alien culture through electronic media in the name of globalization, on the other hand, large scale distress-destitution-deprivation of our people amidst politico-economic criminalization and increasing helplessness of common person in daily life - all these created a space for and played an immense role in the spread of intolerance and hatred using religion. These were the key opportunities, which have created the increasing demand for growth of religion-based communal politics. The consequent emergence of economics of fundamentalism can be seen as a supply side response to that demand. And, supply creates its own demand.
Islam in East-Bengal: historically liberal, humanistic and secular Most of the written histories pertaining to the evolution of Islam in East Bengal (now Bangladesh) are incomplete and euphemistic. They are not based on empirical evidences, and lack knowledge-based inferences. Objective analyses of materials of historiography, such as geography, changes of river morphology, emergence and evolution of agrarian civilization, changing pattern of land revenue collection, historical chronology, politics of the Hindu Raja and that of the Muslim emperors - have not been made in understanding the essence of evolution of Islam in East-Bengal. The relevant historiography is rather weak in this respect. The origin and evolution of Islam in East-Bengal - in the writings of historians - are available in four lines of historiography of Islamization in East Bengal - Immigration, Sword, Patronage, and Social Liberation. None of these historiographic lines are complete in terms of empirical substantiation. The pertinent issues without satisfactory answers include: Who are the
1. Crisis of dollar economics has many dimensions. Dollarisation of economy has led Latin America, South-East Asia, and many developing countries of South Asia to crisis situation (Stigliz 2002). In this regard special mention may be made that United States is the most powerful but highly indebted country of the world. Imports of United States are a few times larger than its exports. To make up the gap, US economy has to depend to a large extent on foreign lenders. Current account deficit of United States, is on average US $ 500 billion a year. In this process, indebtedness of USA stands at $2 trillion at present, which is more than 20% of their GDP. At present US economy has to repay on average $200 billion with a rate of interest of 3% per annum. If the indebtedness continues at the present rate indebtedness of USA in the year 2010 will stand at 65% of its GDP. Without new taxes imposed on US citizens, the budget deficit of USA will go on increasing. 2. War, in most cases, is a profitable business. It is to note that, USA spends more on military expenditure ($375 billion per year) than rest of the world combined together. Economist Nordhause may make rigorous exercise and say that USA may suffer a loss of $200 billion to $3,000 billion in Iraq war. In fact, this loss is not a real loss. Milton Friedman has put up a long list and stated that the war will benefit the world and world economy will boom. Lots of armaments are being sold. The business for reconstruction of Postwar Iraq has got momentum. Generally after a major war, business on arms and ammunitions goes on robust way in the third world. This is also taking place and if nowhere else this is taking place in countries with kingship in "good autocratic country". This may be kept in mind, that most of the imperialist countries are energy dependent and energy security of those countries constitute a key determinant of long-run development. The best routes of oil geography are oil of the middle Asia, oil route of Afghanistan, oil of Iraq etc. `War for Oil' is central to US strategy in Iraq. Iraq has the second largest oil reserves in the world, and Iraqi oil is very easily accessible and cheap. "If you control Iraq, you are in a very strong position to determine the price and production levels (not too high, not too low) to undermine OPEC, and to throw your weight around throughout the world. This has nothing in particular to do with access to the oil for import into the United States. It's about control of the oil… In the Middle East, the United States wants control". (Chomsky 2005 : 5-7). |
immigrants? When and how did the immigrants arrive? When and how was Islam transformed into mass religion in this country with the power of sword? History tells us that, even the most conservative Mogul emperor Awrangazeb (1658-1707) did not encourage or exert pressure for religious purposes. Akbar (1556-1605) abolished discriminatory land revenue system, banned activities offensive to Hindus, e,g., cow slaughter, admitted Hindu sages into his private audience and Rajput chieftains into his ruling class. He ordered that the holy book of the Hindus should be translated into Persian and celebrated Hindu festivals etc.
In fact, in the subcontinent as a whole, there is an inverse relationship between the degree of Muslim political penetration and the degree of Islamization. Dhaka was the residence of the Nawab for about a hundred years but it contained a smaller proportion of Muslims than any of the surrounding districts, except Faridpur. Malda and Murshidabad contained the old capitals, which were the center of Muslim rule for about 450 years, and yet the Muslims formed a smaller proportion of the population as compared to that in the adjacent districts of Dinajpur, Rajshahi, and Nadia (Census of India 1901).
The main initiators of Islam in East Bengal - the Sufis-Devotees-Ulamaas - did not preach extreme religious rites during their time in the last many centuries. Even they did not support any religious persecution. On the other hand, they kept the place of religious activity - Tomb, Mosque, Madrasa, etc - small in size. They cleared the forest and expanded the areas for agricultural activity in the once-forest hinterland. They got this hinterland forest as grant. This implies that they involved people in economic activities, primarily in agriculture. Side by side, Sufis put more emphasis on activities related to rendering humane services. They never persuaded people much to accept Islam. Their main motto was to, "service to the best of the creations", that is, `service to human person (Ashraful Maklukath) is religion'. There is no evidence whatsoever indicating that the Sufis in Bengal actually indulged in the destruction of temples or places of worship of other religions.
The Sufis and their contemporary religious persons brought about admixture of religious ideas with economic development and agricultural production (of course analysis of city-based aristocracy "Ashraf" thesis is different). From the writings of the Sufis and Devotees, such evidence is there that "Allah sent Adam to Sandip Island'. Gabriel at the instruction of Allah asked Adam to go to Mecca to build the original Kaba. After Kaba was built Gabriel gave him a plough and yoke, a pair of draft bullocks, and some grains, and communicated the instruction of Allah: "agriculture will be your destiny", Adam sowed the grains, raised crops, harvested and prepared bread with the corns" . 3
Therefore, in contradistinction with the main theses of most historiographers we see no significant role of Sword, Immigration or Patronage in propagation of Islam in East-Bengal. Islam evolved in East Bengal as an adjunct of agriculture based civilization. Sufis and Devotees of Islam along with preachers of other religions participated in struggle against feudalism and colonialism. They even gave leadership to such movement. The Sufis and Ulamaas took such steps using the usual logic of liberal humanism of religion.
Sources of Islamist extremism - Outcome of contemporary regressive transformation For the first time in the history of Islam in East Bengal, a major regressive trend was evident in the last century which can be treated as a major disaster in the socio-political life in Bengal. It was the time, when at one stage, in the process of anti-colonial movements, a move came to establish a State based on religion, meaning thereby creation of Pakistan for the Muslims and Hindustan for the Hindus. This widely known "two nation theory" can be denoted as the first formal basis for the formation of "Political Islam" in Bengal. The Sufis and the Ulamaas of the liberal humanism of Islam could not oppose the division of the United India on the basis of religion. This regressive transformation against the main religious course did not take place all on a sudden. Specific aggressive courses of religion (such as Wahabi, etc.) were in place. As a result, a negative transformation of humanistic welfarism of Sufi's-Ulamaa's Islam took pace. What was liberal, humanistic and secular turned into parochial aggressiveness. The object was to capture state power through use of "political Islam" in narrow
3 The Rise of Islam and Bengal Frontier-1206 to 1760' by Richard Eton quoted from Saiyid Sultan's epic poem "Nabi Bangsa". |
selfish interest. With the establishment of Pakistan State based on religion, a new trend was set. The trend of capturing state power through aggressive religious fundamentalism arose from a peaceful economic evolution-based agrarian development. Religious communalism became so powerful in Pakistan that in 1965 Indo-Pak war, the feudal-army rulers of that time did not take even twenty four hours time to level all the Hindus of East Pakistan into Hindustani. They proclaimed 'Enemy Property Act', which implies that all the Hindus residing in Pakistan are the enemies 4 . Such religion-based communalism supported by the state was never ever in evidence in the history of East Bengal.
The religion-based division of the country took place without the informed consent of the people (irrespective of Hindu, Muslim, Buddhist or Christian). They were not involved in the process of division of the country (the so-called referendum was just a tokenism). People's opinion was not respected. That is why at that time there was bluffing slogan like, "Biri (or Bidi - a locally made cigarette) in the hand, beetle nut in the mouth, we'll establish Pakistan through fighting" 5. On the other hand, people with vision declared "this independence is a blunt lie, because millions are hungry" 6. The country was divided on the basis of religion (no one felt the need to seek opinion of mass people). Largely due to preponderance of the people of one religion in conducting state affairs, feudalistic Pakistan took the aggressive religious form. In India, the situation was not that acute, because in relatively a large country like India, confluence of various religions and from the very beginning the politico-economic evolution of equality and equity were given recognition Constitutionally. In addition, both democracy and media have played critical role.
During the whole period of Pakistan (1947 to 1971), religion-based communalism was utilized in conducting the state affairs and the socio cultural activities. For overcoming any socio-political crisis religion was (mis) used. They would say, 'Islam in danger', wherever there was any problem. For maintaining military rule and autocracy "Islam in danger" was the only slogan. Finally, this same slogan was used against our liberation war, in 1971. Slogan "Islam in danger" was used when Punjabi, Sindhi, Baluch army were brought from West Pakistan to East Pakistan to fight the Freedom Fighters. Of course, many of the Pak-Army witnessed a different situation in East Pakistan. The same slogan "Islam in danger" was used in this country while forming so called "peace committee". The Albadar, Alshams, Rajakar, etc. were formed with a handful of Bengali Muslim collaborators who were against the liberation of this country. These war criminals were certain that the Bengalis imbued with ideas of liberation war would be defeated by the joint effort of the powerful Pakistan military and these local collaborators - Rajakars, Albadar, Alshams. But the opposite happened. At the price of huge blood, we earned our independence. But we failed to punish the war criminals who were opposed to our liberation war. This has played a decisive role in bolstering their audacity. Those religion-traders (they were not as religious as the Sufis and the Ulamaas) and a handful of their followers are the representatives of extreme religious communalism and economics of fundamentalism in Bangladesh. In this country, this was a great distortion of religion. This may be termed the second phase of regressive transformation in Islam of East Bengal. In this country, evolution of Islam in its historical perspective (Sufism) is distinctly different from the present day fundamentalism and their political economy. Therefore, today's religious extremism can be treated as a continuation of religion-based act of terrorism of 1971 on a larger scale with a deeper base. This regressive transformation got impetus and crystallized with the legitimization of communalism in Constitution when `secularism' was replaced by "Islam will be State religion" (Article 2A).
Communalism in Pakistan not only worked as a basis for forming the State, this gained in strength in a big way afterwards. For freeing the people from discrimination of two-economies, independence of Bangladesh was declared in 1971. People of this country dreamt of a welfare state, where freedom of choice would be there, where economic opportunities would be open to all, where social facilities would be evolved, where political freedom would be available, where there would be transparency and protective security, where there would be non-communal environment and where secularism would evolve as a state principle. The Constitution of independent Bangladesh State makes such promises publicly. Such a state also meets the demand for fundamental rights of equality of men and women, irrespective of religions and caste. In real sense, the difference between the promise and reality was so stark that possibility existed for spread of economics of fundamentalism and related politics of religious extremism.
4. Because of enactment of this inhuman communal act in 1965 and its continuation till 2001 (as "Vested Property Act") about 5 million people belonging to Hindu community have lost 2.1 million acres of land property (details see, Barkat A et.al, 2000). 5. "Hat me biri mu me pan - Larke lenge Pakistan" - the causes behind popularity of this slogan can be traced as a result of interplay of two factors, namely about 200 years of colonialism and exploitation of the feudal lords in East Bengal, most of who were Hindus. 6. "Yee Azadi Jhuta Hai Lakho Insan Bhukha Hai". |
Economic and social basis of economics fundamentalism The foundation of economics of fundamentalism is not weak in Bangladesh. This is because although feudal relationship of production has formally come to an end in Bangladesh economy, the traditional feudal psychology has not been abolished on the one hand, and capitalist relationship of production has not yet evolved, on the other. Various types of worse form of capital has evolved, which does not play a conducive role towards productive investment. This worse form of vulture capitalism is much more conducive to the production of "briefcase capitalism" (commission agency) than strongly-based home grown industrial capitalism. This capitalism is more interested in "real estate and mall-centric economy" than in "productive industrial-agriculture center economy". Therefore, from structural point of view, the system is not conducive to generation of employment in a labor surplus economy, and thereby, not conducive to poverty reduction.7 Also, such free market economy is never poor-friendly. The so-called free market within the context of globalized monopoly capitalism has not been instrumental in developing national capitalism in Bangladesh. To the contrary, that has acted as a hindrance, which has also fueled the rise of communal politics and Islamic extremism in Bangladesh. From the point of view of structural transformation, during the last 34 years (1971-2005) of independence there has not been any fundamental progressive "pro-poor" changes in the economy of Bangladesh. It cannot be said that the spirit of human welfare of independence has been realized. The basic objective of independence was to create healthy people - healthy nation without divide, imbued with the spirit of liberation. The gap between people's aspiration and reality has been wide and ever increasing. This widening of gaps between the aspiration and reality has also helped to grow and nourish religious fundamentalism in Bangladesh.
It is true that the independent Bangladesh has emerged as result of struggle against discrimination in two economies. But the trend of evolution of last 34 years shows a clear division of the country of 140 million into two parts: In the first part are the powerful people of small groups, their number is no more than 1 million (including family members). In the second part are the large numbers of people who are powerless and whose number will be 139 million. Due to machination of politics and economics a situation has been created, where 139 million powerless people exist against only 1 million powerful people. These 139 million people are basically helpless, deprived, destituted and distressed. In real sense, there was no conscious socio-political effort from the side of the governance quarters to make these large numbers of powerless people in to a powerful ones or empowering them by way of inclusion of the excluded. On the contrary, multi-faceted efforts are on to increase the power of the powerful people in the society. It appears that this trend will continue for long. The overall politico-economic equation in the society indicates to this direction.
There is no doubt about it that majority of the powerless people in Bangladesh - whatever is reflected in the "statistical economy" of the government relating to index of employment and standard of living - lead their life in extreme sufferings and misery. The relative share of the poor people in total national household income is on the decline. At the same time, the relative share of the rich people is increasing - this is officially recognized. In parallel, a self-destructing culture of plundering and culture of secrecy (opposite to transparency) have made their strong roots in the sectors of economy, politics, administration, education, and culture. Black money, violence, illegal arms, muscle power, illegal gratification, kickback, speed money, corruption, mal-administration, oppression-repression, etc. are the determinants of culture of plundering. All these contribute to the rise of economics of fundamentalism and to the consolidation of religion based politics ("Political Islam") in Bangladesh.
The basic tendency in the socio-economic evolution during the last 34 years depicts that 1 million criminals have trapped 139 million helpless people in the framework of institutionalized criminalization. A powerful criminal minority, and a powerless majority (the victims of criminalization) - these two trends are clearly in existence in Bangladesh. The rise and development of political economy of fundamentalism during the last 34 years (see Balance Sheet in Table 1) depict a scenario, which makes it clear that whatever is against human welfare and human development is on the rise. Everything including human relationship has turned into market commodity and that of a distorted market. In the absence of patriotic and farsighted leadership the politico-economic base for production and people's welfare has not expanded.
During the last 34 years economic criminalization has acted as a powerful catalyst to criminalize all spheres of politics and society. We have attained a sort of perpetuating exclusion of the excluded situation; an environment aggravating the alienation process of the excluded; a scenario which has created conditions for more active denial to address the issues pertaining to the broadening of human choices for full-life (to ensure five types of freedom people shall enjoy). The balance sheet (Table 1) shows vividly that we are now caught in a trap of culture of plundering wherein the overall environment favors everything which is against human development, which is fully in congruence with the interest of criminalization. The thirty-four years' balance sheet depicts a clear tendency: The status of all indicators conducive to human development is getting worse, and indicators associated with criminalization trap are getting stronger, and thereby, limiting the scopes for broadening human choices to exercise their own free will. During the past three decades of our development we are again back to the discriminatory two-economy (with more strength): One economy is represented by only one million people who are most powerful (in the steering wheel, irrespective of who holds the formal power), and the other economy is represented by the unempowered majority, 139 million people - the excluded, deprived and distressed (According to article 7 of our Constitution, "All powers in the Republic belong to the People").
The analysis of the type of development presented in Balance Sheet (Table 1) shows that whatever good positive aspects will benefit the people has not increased, rather it has declined and whatever negative aspects were bad for the country has in fact increased expeditiously. During last 34 years some people became owners of unlimited wealth and larger section of the people have become poorer (the hapless - alienated people look for shelter). Sources of unearned income increased at a high rate, but pomp and show have gone up and sufferings of various kinds of the larger section of the people have expanded. Multi-storied buildings have been erected, but side by side the number of slums has gone up; government's real allocations for welfare of people have declined, and side by side un-productive expenditures have gone up; donor interferences has increased and side by side local initiatives have gone down and government allocation has gone up in unproductive sector. The distance between the public and public servants has increased. Election expenditure has gone up but good governance and efficacy of elected institutions have gone down; power of black money has gone up and politician's respect for people has gone down, and discrimination between rich and poor has increased. Government's real allocation in basic education has gone down. Poverty-related diseases have increased and real expenditure on people's health has gone down, and efficacy of government health sector has eroded. Trading on religion increased, number of Pirs, Fakirs, astrologers, fortune-tellers, violence in the name of religion - all have gone up, and love for people of different religion has declined. Culture of rationality and science, secular behavior and enlightened mind-set have tarnished. In other words, cultural communalism has deepened. Side by side, communalism in education has increased the strength of economic power of fundamentalism. During last 34 years, the number of mainstream primary schools has doubled but the number of Dakhil Madrasas (religious schools) has increased eight times. Over the same time, enrolments in primary schools have doubled but those in Dakhil Madrasas increased thirteen times; per head public expenditure on students of the government middle class educational institutions is Tk. 3000 as against Tk.5,000 in Madrasa sector. Therefore, the "intellectual" basis for rise of religious extremism is in full-swing operation. At the same time, in any future reform of the religious educational system, this may specially be considered that majority of the Madrasa students have come from poor or low-income families.
7. Economistic idea about poverty is mostly narrowly defined one indicating income poverty or food poverty (measured in terms of direct calorie intake or cost of basic needs). Poverty, which creates space for fundamentalism should be viewed in a broader sense as a complex interrelated domain of the following: income poverty, poverty due to hunger, poverty due to low wage, poverty due to unemployment, poverty due to lack of shelter, poverty due to lack of access to public resources including rights to khas land, poverty due to lack of education, poverty due to ill health, poverty mediated through environmental hazards, political poverty (due to lack of political freedom), poverty due to lack of transparency guarantee, poverty due to lack of protective security, poverty mediated through various forms of marginalization (e.g., among religious minorities, indigenous peoples, poor women, slum dwellers, char people, rickshaw-van pullers etc.), and poverty of mind set (details see Barkat 2006b). |
Table 1: A 34 years' Balance sheet of Bangladesh: Trend showing expansion of politico-economic basis for religious extremism (Source: Adopted from Abul Barkat 2003)
Indicators showing upward trend | Indicators showing downward trend |
Black economy/black money and associated plundering, crime, terrorism, illegal arms, muscle power, corruption, bribe, money laundering, bad governance, repression, oppression, torture, persecution, killing, physical assault | Strengthening economic foundation; development of national capital; industrialization; economic capability to run normal family economy; employment generation; efficacy of institutions dealing with black economy |
Billionaire and beggars/paupers; forcibly grabbing of land and water-bodies; new cars and flats, and new techniques of begging; number of people die to collect Zakat clothes (during Eid); number of people sick and death due to cold and heat waves | Economic opportunities; employment generation (first condition of human development); poor peoples' ownership and access to resources |
Rural-to-urban forced migration; number of people living in slum; informal sector; nuclear families; distress and deprivation of children-women-older people | Poor and marginal farmers control over land; rural employment; real income/wage; extended families |
Legal and illegal import and export; unearned income; imbalanced economic growth and development | Efficient use of human potentials and resources; use of capital for industrialization; development of small and cottage industries and entrepreneurship. |
Foreign grant-loan projects; NGO activities | Local initiatives; incentives to promote best use of local resources; peoples' participation in social and economic development |
Communication; information technology; number of students in computer and business education | General science education; technological basis; students in science and philosophy; intellectual pursuits |
Women's employment and mobility; violence against women and children; women and child trafficking; acid throwing | Real wage/income of female workers; protective security of women and child; efficacy of institutions responsible to ensure protective securities for women and children |
Private sector commercial universities, colleges, coaching centres, English medium schools, kinder garden, madrasha (including English medium); rich-poor disparity in education | Public/private schools, colleges and universities for common people; quality of education in public schools and low-cost private sector; efficacy of education system; public sector real allocation for basic education |
Use of religion with business motive; religious institutions; number of pir-fakirs; religion-based political parties; violence by the name of religion; expressed uneasiness to people belonging to other religion; fatalism; number of palmists | Equal respect to people of other religion; science institutions; scientific mind-set; enlightened worldview; discussion meetings about science and knowledge; healthy life style; secular feelings-behavior-mind-set |
Expensive private clinics, diagnostic centres; anxiety and poverty-related diseases; health expenditure; pauperization due to health expenditure | Primary health care; quality of public health service; actual per capita public health expenditure; efficacy of public health system |
Real expenditure on unproductive sectors: military (defense), administration, security related areas; distance between public and public servants; influencing the court | Good governance; justice; feeling of individual security; real public sector expenditure for human welfare and in productive sectors |
Investment in election; competition of black money holders in elections; distance between people and elected representative/institutions | Efficacy/utility of elected persons and institutions; people's trust on the elected person and institution; enlightened politics |
Exogenous decadent culture; wastage of time in viewing and listening to decadent culture; mutual mistrust | Practice of national culture; feelings of solidarity; mutual trust and respect; human(e) values - moral, ethical and aesthetic |
Erosion of political values; criminalization of politics; psychophanism; politics as business investment; autocracy, (latent) demand for welfare politics. | Politicians love for people; politicians patriotism, knowledge-based and humanitarian ideology-based politics, democratic values. |
The pattern of development mediated through economic and political criminalization and anti-poor anti-middle class political economy has transformed the socio-economic class structure in both rural and urban Bangladesh. This changing class structure is highly compatible with the rise of religious extremism and economics of fundamentalism. The nature of such transformation of socio-economic class structure in Bangladesh (an unexplored subject so far) indicates an overall deteriorating situation of the poor and middle class, and concentration of assets and power among a few rich. The following features reflecting the trends in socio-economic class structure, which explain the real reason(s) for rise of religious extremism and economics of fundamentalism, are in order (Table 2): 1. Out of 140 million people in Bangladesh, 91 million (65%) are poor, 45 million (32.1%) represent middle class, and the rest, 4 million (2.97%) are rich. Two decades back (in 1984), the number of poor people was 60 million (60% of total population) i.e. the number of poor people has increased by 31 million in last 20 years. This rising number of poor and increasing poverty - an outcome of failure in the national development - constitute a solid basis of influence of religiosity and religious extremism in Bangladesh.
Notes on methodology: There is no officially accepted (by the government's statistics office) methodology to identify socio-economic classes in Bangladesh. In order to understand the dynamics of changes in the social structure in Bangladesh, the author has devised a methodology to quantify the population into different socio-economic classes. For classification of rural population household land ownership and for urban population amount of asset valuation has been used as criterion. The following classification formula has been used: Poor or less asset group are those having up to 100 decimals of land (in rural) and total valuation of asset less than Tk. 0.5 million (in urban); lower middle class was denoted as those having 101-249 decimals of land ownership (in rural) and asset valuation of Tk. 0.5-0.9 million (in urban); mid-middle class comprises those households having 250-499 decimals of own land (in rural) and asset valuation of Tk. 1-2.9 million (in urban); upper middle class was denoted as those having 500-749 decimals of land ownership (in rural) and asset valuation of Tk. 3-4.9 million (in urban), finally, the rich (upper class) was denoted as those households having 750 decimals or more of land ownership (in rural) and valuation of asset of Tk.5 million or more (in urban).
2. Poor are disproportionately highly concentrated in the rural areas compared to the urban: 85% poor live in the rural and 15% in the urban areas. Among the rural households 60% are landless, 80% do not have access to electricity in household (one should count that electricity is not just light it is enlightenment)8 , and 65% do not have access to public health system; and urbanization in Bangladesh is basically "slumization" or ruralization of urban life without concomitant industrialization and with growing informal sectors.9 This nature of poverty in both rural and urban areas forms a fertile ground for religious extremism and associated activities. 3. During the last 20 years (1984-2004), while the total population has increased by 40% the population in the `poor' category has increased by about 52%. Therefore, it is most likely, that the growth in poverty-led fundamentalism should have been high in the last 20 years. 4. Among the current 45 million population representing middle class, 14 million (52% of middle class) are in the lower middle class, 15 million (35%) are in the mid-middle class, and the rest 6 million (13%) are in the upper middle class. This middle class - especially the unstable lower and mid-middle classes - forms the intellectual drivers of fundamentalism and the key to the `success' of religious militant activities. In this connection, the following elements in the class dynamics showing rising inequality are worth analysis: