[ALOCHONA] Special consideration for Premier Bank of Dr HMB Iqbal

Special consideration for Premier Bank of Dr HMB Iqbal

 

 

http://prothom-alo.com/detail/date/2010-04-20/news/57619

__._,_.___

[Disclaimer: ALOCHONA Management is not liable for information contained in this message. The author takes full responsibility.]
To unsubscribe/subscribe, send request to alochona-owner@egroups.com

Your email settings: Individual Email|Traditional
Change settings via the Web (Yahoo! ID required)
Change settings via email: Switch delivery to Daily Digest | Switch to Fully Featured
Visit Your Group | Yahoo! Groups Terms of Use | Unsubscribe

__,_._,___

[ALOCHONA] Indian Perspective on War Crimes Trials

From Genocide to Justice?

Anshuman Behera
Research Assistant, Institute for Conflict Management

 

After 39 long years, the Bangladesh Government is all set to bring the War Criminals (WCs) of 1971 to justice. In its election manifesto the Awami League leader and its Prime Ministerial candidate, Sheikh Hasina, had made it crystal clear that the men who collaborated with the Pakistan Army and Government in the genocide of an estimated 3 million people during the Liberation War, and in the use of rape and collective slaughters as instruments of state policy, would finally be taken to account.

 

With a clear mandate in the election of December 2008, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has moved decisively to fulfil this commitment, within her larger initiatives to reverse the politics of extremism and political violence that had progressively come to dominate her country. There is a significant overlap between the two objectives – curtailing Islamist extremism and terrorism, and bring the WCs to justice – since the principal players in both are the same. The Tribunal, which is mandated to trail and prosecute the WCs, was constituted on March 25, 2010. The Government had also appointed an investigative and research organisation, the War Criminals Fact Finding Committee (WCFFC), which handed over a list of WCs and documented evidence in support of charges against them, on April 4, 2010. According to the convener of the WCFFC, M. A. Hassan, the documentation comprehended 18 books, the names and addresses of 1,775 alleged WCs, and detailed accounts of crimes, including mass killings. On March 23, moreover, reports indicated that the Government had approved a list of war criminals prepared by the National Security Intelligence (NSI) and the Criminal Investigation Department (CID).

 

Crucially, unlike any earlier regime at Dhaka, the Sheikh Hasina Government has placed law enforcement and intelligence agencies on an alert to prevent alleged WCs from fleeing Bangladesh during the trials.

 

Reinforcing these moves, the Government also plans to deploy some six million Ansar (Village Defence Party) members countrywide to combat militancy and improve law and order, creating conditions for the smooth conduct of the proposed trials.

 

These are giant steps, after decades of collusion by successive regimes, but a backlash is already forming. Sheikh Hasina has repeatedly warned that Islamist fundamentalist political formations such as the Jamaat-e-Islami (JeI), one of the principal actors in the 1971 genocide, and powerful pro-Pakistan groups such as the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), under the leadership of former Prime Minister Begum Khalida Zia, Sheikh Hasina's arch rival, will do everything in their power to scuttle the trials. Addressing her countrymen, party workers and ministers on March 27, 2010, Shiekh Hasina warned,

As the process of the trial of war criminals started, a conspiracy is being hatched by certain quarters against it. You have to remain vigilant to prevent any sort of conspiracy in the greater national interest... those who have politically rehabilitated the war criminals after the brutal assassination of Bangabandhu [Sheikh Mujibur Rehman] along with most of his family members may try to create instability in the country ahead of the trials.

On April 11, she added, further,

...the intention of the Opposition against the Government is to protect the war criminals. They have adopted the same way to protect the war criminals as they did to save the killers of Bangabandhu (Sheikh Mujibur Rehman).

The political Right in Bangladesh is whipping up a propaganda campaign claiming that the Sheikh Hasina regime is trying to `muzzle' the Opposition by abusing legal processes and the "farce of war crimes".

 

However, State Minister for Law, Qamrul Islam, reiterated, on March 30,

We have no political motive. We would certainly maintain international standards in the trial process and would be transparent... Despite repeated calls to cooperate with the Government for trying war criminals, the opposition party [BNP] and the JeI leaders are hatching a conspiracy to foil the process by making audacious remarks. The Government would certainly try the war criminals within its tenure despite all kinds of obstacles."

The JeI has more than one reason to attempt to thwart the war crimes trials. The top JeI leadership stands accused, and, if convicted, would permanently lose the right to contest elections to Parliament and other local bodies. A senior JeI leader conceded, on March 24, that "there is possibility that a number of Jamaat leaders might be detained on charge of war crimes after the investigation." Other Jamaat leaders have also voiced concern about the start of the trial process and possible detention.

 

Noted Bangladesh watcher Hiranmay Karlekar argues, further, that the Jamaat, along with its student's wing, Islami Chhatra Shibir (ICS or Shibir), constitute the matrix within which terrorist organizations like Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami Bangladesh (HuJI-B), Jama'atul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB), Jagrata Muslim Janata Bangladesh (JMJB) and Ahle Hadith Andolan Bangladesh (AHAB) evolved. Leaders like Mufti Abdul Hannan and Bangla Bhai aka Siddiqul Islam, `Operations Commanders' of the HuJI-B and JMJB respectively, till their arrest and eventual executions, Abdur Rahman of JMB, Muhammad Asadullah al-Galib of AHAB, graduated either from the Jamaat or the Shibir or both. The war crimes trials would, in fact, constitute a major setback to the entire spectrum of Islamist extremist groups in Bangladesh.

 

Significantly, the Government has also taken the initiatives to investigate a number of Non- Governmental Organisations (NGOs) that emerged during the BNP-JeI coalition regime between 2001 and 2006. It is believed that the huge funding the Jamaat gets from Islamic fundamentalist and extremist groups abroad is channelled through these NGOs. Investigations of these NGOs could cripple the Jamaat's operations.

 

Crucially, since the Jamaat has been the gateway of Pakistani interests in Bangladesh since and before the war years, as well as the principal instrument of Pakistan-backed militant and terrorist activities, it is evident that Pakistan will not easily accept the war crimes trials.

 

Unsurprisingly, the Jamaat is resorting to every possible means to obstruct the trial process. Of all such initiatives, the most important involves its students' wing, the ICS, which is trying to provoke violence. The Rajshahi University murder, on February 9, 2010, is a case in point. An activist of the Bangladesh Chhatra League (BCL), Faruk Hossain, was killed by cadres of the ICS at Rajshahi University, and another 100 were injured in overnight clashes between the BCL and ICS. Though the Government controlled the situation, arresting some 437 ICS cadres after February 9, the impact of the violence that followed the killing, particularly on the functioning of educational institutions, is still perceptible.

 

Further, the Jamaat, along with BNP lawmaker, Abdul Wadud, has been accused by a parliamentary body, on March 10, of instigating unrest and violence in the Hill Districts, with the assistance of Pakistan's Inter Services Intelligence (ISI). Some of the recent Jamaat activities have prominently included:

 

March 4: Kishoreganj Police arrested two JeI cadres, RamjanAli and AzizulHuq, of the Kishoreganj District unit while leading a procession in the town protesting against the Government.

 

March 11: The Police recovered 37 handmade bombs from a sand heap outside district JeI office at Bhadughar of Brahmanbaria District.

March 22: The JeI cadres assaulted a freedom fighter, his wife and son and set ablaze his house at Kashidangi village under Baliadangi sub-district of Thakurgaon District.

 

March 28: JeI Secretary General Ali Ahsan Mohammad Mojaheed warned the Government of an `explosive situation' if his party leaders and workers were roped in on "imaginary charges". The warning came in the wake of wide speculations that JeI leaders would soon be brought to the dock on charge of war crimes.

 

April 9: Police arrested four cadres of JeI and ICS as they took out a procession in the city streets violating Section 144 imposed by Barisal District Police Commissioner.

 

The BNP is also exerting all possible pressure on the trial process. Initially, the party left its closest ally, the JeI, to face the music on its own. However, once the Government's initiatives surged forward, the BNP sought increasingly to confuse the issue. In its official statement on the war criminal trials, the Party's General Secretary, Khandakar Delwar Hossain stated, on April 2, "The Government has stepped away from the trials of the war criminals and now they are holding the trials of the crimes against humanity, deviating from the election manifesto". He also questioned the formation of a special tribunal to carry out the trial. Ironically, one of the senior leaders Khandakar Mosharraf Hossain of the BNP, on March 31, alleged that Sheikh Hasina had given shelter to war criminals: "…the BNP demands the trail of Sheikh Hasina as she joined hands with the war criminals and provided them shelter."

 

Despite BNP-JeI opposition, the trial process is moving forward. In one instance, cases have been filed against 19 alleged war criminals, including JeI leader Maulana A.K.M. Yusuf, on February 17, 2010. On March 24, just before the formation of the WCT, JeI leaders Mohammad Kamaruzzaman and Addur Razzaque were barred from going abroad. On April 7, 14 people, including an advocate Muslem Uddin, an Awami League law maker were sued for their alleged involvement in war crimes.

 

Though the Government's commitment to take the war crimes proceedings quickly forward is evident, there are powerful forces of subversion that continue to operate in Bangladesh. Despite tremendous strides forward on a multiplicity of fronts over the past year, the country remains fragile and susceptible to destabilization. The BNP-JeI combine retain the backing of the Pakistani intelligence and military establishment, and, apart from directly compromising Pakistani influence in Bangladesh, the war crimes threaten to bring a close focus on Pakistan's hideous record in 1971 – something Islamabad has, astonishingly, been able to brush under the carpet for nearly four decades. While the JeI and its linked radical Islamist terrorist network has suffered tremendous reverses over the past years, the Party retains substantial grassroots influence, a nationwide institutional infrastructure, and a strong cadre base. The 2008 elections have been an enormous defeat for the BNP-JeI combine, but the struggle to stabilize this troubled country is far from over. It remains to be seen whether the war crimes trials will secure greater stability, or provoke a confrontation that can undermine the incipient gains of the past year. http://www.satp.org/satporgtp/sair/index.htm

 

 

__._,_.___

[Disclaimer: ALOCHONA Management is not liable for information contained in this message. The author takes full responsibility.]
To unsubscribe/subscribe, send request to alochona-owner@egroups.com

Your email settings: Individual Email|Traditional
Change settings via the Web (Yahoo! ID required)
Change settings via email: Switch delivery to Daily Digest | Switch to Fully Featured
Visit Your Group | Yahoo! Groups Terms of Use | Unsubscribe

__,_._,___

[ALOCHONA] Gas, power crisis stalled investment

Gas, power crisis stalled investment

 

 

 

 

http://www.amardeshonline.com/pages/details/2010/04/20/28262

 

http://174.133.126.18/~dailykal/index.php?view=details&type=single&pub_no=140&cat_id=1&menu_id=13&news_type_id=1&index=0

__._,_.___

[Disclaimer: ALOCHONA Management is not liable for information contained in this message. The author takes full responsibility.]
To unsubscribe/subscribe, send request to alochona-owner@egroups.com

Your email settings: Individual Email|Traditional
Change settings via the Web (Yahoo! ID required)
Change settings via email: Switch delivery to Daily Digest | Switch to Fully Featured
Visit Your Group | Yahoo! Groups Terms of Use | Unsubscribe

__,_._,___

[ALOCHONA] People becoming restive for power, water and gas

People becoming restive for power, water and gas

Demanding water, gas and electricity, agitation, protest rally and human chain programmes at different parts of capital have already taken place

The demand for uninterrupted supply of water, gas and electricity among the city dwellers has been mounting and taking the shape of a movement.

Demanding water, gas and electricity, agitation, protest rally and human chain programmes at different parts of capital have already taken place. On the other hand, some political parties, their associate bodies, some socio-cultural organizations and small and medium business entrepreneurs are mulling waging anti-government agitation as the normal life is being disrupted.

Different section of people including office, school, college and university goers and businessmen and house keepers told this correspondent that the activities of daily life are seriously being hampered due to want of water for the last couple of months.

Inhabitants of Mirpur, Mohammadpur, Tejgaon, Mohakhali, Badda, Moghbazar, Sutrapur, Shyampur, Jatrabari and the old part of the capital Dhaka are facing severe crises of water, gas and electricity. They are not being able to cook properly due to the low voltage of gas and take bath due to absence of water and they could not sleep for nagging load shedding.

The problems of daily life are being created only for absence of electricity. These irritated, under privileged and deprived city dwellers may come down on the street collectively for movement against the government anytime, a group of people at Farmgate area said while talking to this reporter.

Meanwhile, opposition BNP is going to arrange two-day-long protest meeting demanding adequate supply of water, gas and electricity. They will stage demonstration at around 50 different parts of the capital on April 21 to 22.

According to sources, the city dwellers are now receiving around 1300 megawatt electricity per day against the existing needs of 2200 mw. The city dwellers are also receiving around 1450 million cubic feet gas (mmcfd) against the existing 1700 mmcfd needs. Besides, city's water demand is about 2100 million liters per day while the WASA supplies 1500 million liters.

 http://www.thebangladeshtoday.com/leading%20news.htm#lead news-01

__._,_.___

[Disclaimer: ALOCHONA Management is not liable for information contained in this message. The author takes full responsibility.]
To unsubscribe/subscribe, send request to alochona-owner@egroups.com

Your email settings: Individual Email|Traditional
Change settings via the Web (Yahoo! ID required)
Change settings via email: Switch delivery to Daily Digest | Switch to Fully Featured
Visit Your Group | Yahoo! Groups Terms of Use | Unsubscribe

__,_._,___

[ALOCHONA] 100 million more Indians now living in poverty

100 million more Indians now living in poverty

NEW DELHI  India now has 100 million more people living below the poverty line than in 2004, according to official estimates released on Sunday, reports Reuters.

The poverty rate has risen to 37.2 percent of the population from 27.5 percent in 2004, a change that will require the Congress-ruled government to spend more money on the poor.

The new estimate comes weeks after Sonia Gandhi, head of the Congress party, asked the government to revise a Food Security Bill to include more women, children and destitute. "The Planning Commission has accepted the report on poverty figures," Abhijit Sen, a member of the Planning Commission told Reuters, referring to the new poverty estimate report submitted by a government panel last December.

India now has 410 million people living below the UN estimated poverty line of $1.25 a day, 100 million more than was estimated earlier, officials said.

India calculates how much of its population is living below the poverty line by checking whether families can afford one square meal a day that meets minimum nutrition needs.

It was not immediately clear how much more the federal government would have to spend on the poor, as that would depend on the Food Security Bill when it is presented to the government after the necessary changes, officials say. India''s Planning Commission will meet the food and expenditure secretaries next week to estimate the cost aspects of the bill, government officials said.

A third of the world's poor are believed to be in India, living on less than $2 per day, worse than in many parts of sub-Saharan Africa, experts say.

The government spends only 1 percent of its Gross Domestic Product (GDP) on healthcare facilities, forcing millions to struggle to get medicines, Oxfam and 62 other agencies said in a report called: "Your Money or Your Life" last year.

While India''s economy is slowly recovering from a global recession with a GDP growth of 7.2 percent, millions of poor in rural India are finding it difficult to cope with around 17 percent food price inflation.

http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/economy/indicators/100-million-more-Indians-now-living-in-poverty/articleshow/5829267.cms

__._,_.___

[Disclaimer: ALOCHONA Management is not liable for information contained in this message. The author takes full responsibility.]
To unsubscribe/subscribe, send request to alochona-owner@egroups.com

Your email settings: Individual Email|Traditional
Change settings via the Web (Yahoo! ID required)
Change settings via email: Switch delivery to Daily Digest | Switch to Fully Featured
Visit Your Group | Yahoo! Groups Terms of Use | Unsubscribe

__,_._,___

[ALOCHONA] PM alleges Khaleda-BDR mutiny link

PM alleges Khaleda-BDR mutiny link

 

Dhaka, Apr 19 (bdnews24.com) – Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina insinuated that BNP chairperson Khaleda Zia was involved with the BDR mutiny of 2009 in some way.

Alleging that Khaleda having prior information about the bloody mutiny, Hasina questioned how the BNP chief came to know of what would happen on Feb 25.
Soldiers of Bangladesh Rifles, border guards, on that day rose up in rebellion against their commanding officers, who were deputed from the army.

The bloody rebellion that lasted into the next day, saw about 70 people dead, with 57 army officers executed. This included the paramilitary force's chief, a major general, and his wife.

The PM called for investigations into Khaleda's activities and whereabouts for three days following the outbreak of the bloody mutiny in the BDR headquarters of Pilkhana. Referring to Khaleda, Hasina asked, "Why did she have to leave her house on a car with tinted glass?"

The prime minister made those comments during a meeting with the Bangladesh Krishak League leaders at her official residence. The Krishak League delegation, led by its president Mirza Abdul Jalil and general secretary Motahar Hossain Molla, met Hasina at Ganabhaban on the founding anniversary of the organisation on Monday.

The PM claimed that Khaleda was in a hideout for three days from Feb 25, 2009.
The prime minister asked where Khaleda had been for those three days and how she knew what would happen. "What was on your mind?"

Hasina said that the reason behind Khaleda going into hiding should be unearthed. Terming her government farmer-friendly, the prime minister claimed that the previous governments of Zia-Ershad-Khaleda did not undertake as many 'initiatives' as those of the current government. She said that the Awami League has always been supportive of the farmers. "But those same farmers are shot down when BNP is in power." 

 

__._,_.___

[Disclaimer: ALOCHONA Management is not liable for information contained in this message. The author takes full responsibility.]
To unsubscribe/subscribe, send request to alochona-owner@egroups.com

Your email settings: Individual Email|Traditional
Change settings via the Web (Yahoo! ID required)
Change settings via email: Switch delivery to Daily Digest | Switch to Fully Featured
Visit Your Group | Yahoo! Groups Terms of Use | Unsubscribe

__,_._,___

[ALOCHONA] British Gen Elections - Bethnal Green and Bow - battle rages in constituency with all-Bangladeshi field

 

Bethnal Green and Bow: battle rages in constituency with all-Bangladeshi field

Labour faces tough task to regain seat lost to George Galloway's Respect party

The Guardian,

Monday 19 April 2010

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2010/apr/19/bethnal-green-bow-labour-respect

 

Rushanara Ali, Labour's candidate for Bethnal Green and Bow. Photograph: Martin Godwin

 

At a meeting of the Columbia Road tenants' association, the talk is of littered flowerbeds and rickety scaffolding. The security light at number 74 is still broken. Amid the razzle of manifesto launches and TV debates it is the ultra-local as much as the national that defines communities' experience of the political process. Never more so than here in Bethnal Green and Bow, where Abjol Miah, the Respect candidate anointed by the sitting MP George Galloway, is squaring up to the first-time Labour candidate Rushanara Ali.

 

For these mainly older, white working-class tenants, the early throes of the parliamentary election campaign have been underwhelming. "We've had a lot of junk through the letter box but you never see them," says Joyce. "I feel terribly let down by George Galloway," adds Margaret. "He was never at his surgery and he never spoke in the house. He had a totally different agenda, and he was courting the Bangladeshi vote."

 

Joyce then says the unsayable. "This is supposed to be a multicultural area but all the candidates are Asian. I don't feel they represent my views." Her husband Bill concurs: "This borough has a proud history of taking in different people over the years, but we feel we're being squeezed out."

 

Huguenots, Irish, Jews, Bengalis and, more recently, Somalis have all found a welcome in the East End of London, in no small part thanks to the radical political culture that has always infused the borough. It's a legacy evidenced at the hustings of 2010 – in a national precedent, all the main parties have selected Bangladeshi Muslim candidates, and the largest Bengali population in the country will finally have a voice in parliament. But Bill is also articulating a concern I've heard voiced by many constituents, of other faiths and backgrounds, that the intricacies of Bengali community politics – intimately connected as these are with the politics of Sylhet, the north-eastern region of Bangladesh from where the majority of Britain's Bengali community originate – will dominate the campaign, to the exclusion of all others.

 

Making up more than 30% of the local population, it's no surprise that Bengali opinion matters in this election. Despite the gentrification that has occurred around the edges of the City, Tower Hamlets remains the third most deprived borough in the country, with 50% of children receiving free school meals, and it is the Bangladeshi community that experiences this most keenly. Traditionally Labour supporting, these are the voters Ali must woo. But, as Jack Gilbert of Sandy's Row synagogue notes: "Groups that are not in the majority still have an important part to play in the borough. It's about the personal values of the candidates, not their faith. They need to demonstrate an ability to represent people whose views they don't necessarily agree with."

 

In 2005, Bethnal Green and Bow proved a totemic battle: Oona King, the Blair Babe beholden to the whip on Iraq, pitted against Gorgeous George, who harnessed the huge momentum of the Tower Hamlets anti-war movement and scraped to victory, becoming the first MP for his newly aggregated party. Since then, the Respect party has seen internal splits, while Galloway's constituents have seen him on Big Brother. It was always his stated intention to stand down at the next election to make way for a local nominee and Miah, a youth worker with strong networks within the mosque fraternity, is a popular figure.

 

"This is going to be a tough battle," Ali admits, "and we're going to have to fight tooth and nail to win the seat back. The culture that Respect have created is a very divisive one, and that's what I want to change. That is not our tradition in the east end of London."

 

Ali, like Miah, moved to Bethnal Green from Bangladesh as a child. "The influence of Galloway has been about playing communities off against each other, and people are talking about that now."

 

The last election campaign was unedifying to say the least, with Galloway menaced at one meeting by a gang of apparent fundamentalists, while King was pelted with eggs when she attended a memorial to Jewish war dead and faced constant insinuations about her ethnic background. "Rushanara is a brave woman," local cultural adviser Naseem Khan says, "because there is a very male, conservative element in Respect."

 

Ali remains sanguine so far. "As a Bengali and as an east ender, I take my courage from the confidence that the community gives me – people from different backgrounds, men, women, white, Bangladeshi, Somali – to rise above that sort of divisive politics."

According to Miah, this is Labour propaganda. "There's an electrifying activism in Tower Hamlets," he says, "and Respect has generated that. We've gained four years of local government experience [Respect won 12 council seats in 2006, and Miah leads the group] and it's no longer just about foreign policy. We're talking about everything from cracks in the pavement to council tax, and the mainstream parties are fearful."

 

Ali is invisible, he says. "Strategically, she's concentrating more outside the Bengali community. Use your village people to create more political awareness within the community but don't upset the majority non-Bangladeshis."

 

It would be powerfully symbolic to have a female Bangladeshi in parliament, Ruhun Chowdhury, chair on the Jagonari Women's Education Resource Centre says . "A lot of younger women will take part because they're happy to see a female candidate."

 

She reminds me that Bangladesh has more women MPs than Britain, as well as a female prime minister: "We've come a long way and it's a success story, not like before when everything was managed by men and the women stayed in the home and didn't know what was going on in the world. Women are taking the initiative."

 

The influence of sons and daughters on family voting decisions will be as important as that of their elders, she believes. Respect succeeded in mobilising the youth vote during the last campaign and, according to Ali Afsar, a 26-year-old park ranger, Miah's credentials will ensure this happens again. "He's a local lad and he's done a lot for young people. The Bangladeshi people are very political and that's grown since the war, which is still a passionate issue. A lot of my friends will be voting this year when they haven't before. He makes you let your anger out in a serious way and stands up against extremists like Islam4UK."

 

As bookseller Sebastian Sands observes: "If you believe the press, you'd think the East London Mosque runs everything around here. But that's not true and it's not my experience that there's too much focus on the Muslim community. There's a big Muslim population in Tower Hamlets and they should be represented, but if you're talking about economic recovery then that affects all of us."

 

Certainly, there has been a stream of hostile coverage about plans to erect arches in the shape of a hijab to mark the beginning of the Brick Lane cultural trail, as well as allegations that Tower Hamlets council has been taken over by Islamic extremists. The reality is, naturally, more complicated.

 

"We pride ourselves that we have Muslim councillors, and why not?" says Miah. "For the last 15 years you've said we're isolationist, ghettoised, unwilling to engage and now that we engage we're fundamentalists and extremists. You can't have it both ways."

__._,_.___

[Disclaimer: ALOCHONA Management is not liable for information contained in this message. The author takes full responsibility.]
To unsubscribe/subscribe, send request to alochona-owner@egroups.com

Your email settings: Individual Email|Traditional
Change settings via the Web (Yahoo! ID required)
Change settings via email: Switch delivery to Daily Digest | Switch to Fully Featured
Visit Your Group | Yahoo! Groups Terms of Use | Unsubscribe

__,_._,___

[ALOCHONA] Chhatra League’s sexual offences

Chhatra League's sexual offences:
a widespread state of denial

As feminists have repeatedly pointed out, eve-teasing is a western and Christian construct, it refers to the temptress nature of Eve, thereby placing the responsibility for sexual harassment on women. On the victims, not the perpetrators. From earlier denial, looking-the-other-way, to victim-blaming? Is this the new AL strategy being fashioned by its ideologists? Rahnuma Ahmed asks

WHILE working on last week's column, 'The Nation, or Chhatra League...?' (published on April 12), I had been in two minds.
   

Should I include sexual offences—aggressive behaviour, molestation, physical assault, violence, rape, asking a buddy to video the incident of rape for subsequent commercial release as pornography, gang-rape—allegedly committed by Bangladesh Chhatra League leaders and activists?No, it deserves a separate column, I thought.
   

I was unaware of media reports on Eden College. For over two months, I'd been totally absorbed in researching and writing the Weather series (February 1–March 29), and had been oblivious to much of what was happening around me. This included allegations against the BCL's women leaders and activists at Eden. But more on that later.
   

By all accounts, there seems to have been a sudden and horrific increase in nationwide violence, largely against girls and young women, over the last couple of months. Ten-year old schoolgirl Shahnaz Begum of Digalbagh village in Mymensingh was raped by two brothers. Killed. October 2009. Eti Moni, a class ten student of Jaldhaka municipality in Nilphamari was raped. Strangled to death. October 2009. A schoolgirl of class three was raped at Ramanandapur village in Pabna sadar. October 2009. Nashfia Akand Pinky, a class IX student, committed suicide by hanging herself because she had been mercilessly teased and harassed, Pashchim Agargaon, Dhaka. January 2010. Nilufar Yasmin Eeti's parents were shot dead by a young man after they turned down his proposal of marriage, Kalachandpur area in Gulshan, Dhaka. March 2010. Fourteen-year old Umme Kulsum Elora, a student of class VII, committed suicide by taking pesticide because of continued harassment. April 2010. Mariam Akter Pinky, a student of class ten, died of burn injuries fuelled by kerosene in Konabhaban village in Kishoreganj; her mother says she saw the young man who had harassed her for the last two years run out of the room. April 2010... there are many more. I stare uncomprehendingly at the horrorof it all.
   

As I scan the newspapers, a recent headline catches my eye, Man stabs himself over refusal of marriage proposal. One lone man. He had preferred to kill himself. Not the woman.
   

And what about sexual offences which, according to media reports, have specifically been committed by BCL leaders and activists? Ahsan Kabir Mamun, also known as Mamun Howladar, information secretary of Pirojpur district committee of the BCL, raped a class X student in Pirojpur, Barisal. September 2009. The incident was recorded on cell phone by his childhood friend 'Ganja' Monir, who happens to be a BNP activist. It was later available as a pornographic CD for sale in local video shops. Mamun insists it was recorded 'secretly', while Monir says he was carrying out Mamun's instructions. Mamun did not deny having raped the girl, but added, the recording (not committing the crime itself, mind you) had been done to 'tarnish' his political and business image. The two families, he said, were closely related. He was to be married to her soon. Her family responded by demanding that he should receive 'exemplary punishment'.
   

A group of 16 young men, in September 2009, abducted a class VII student of Pakhimara in Kalapara upazila in Patuakhali. The young girl was returning home from a Puja mandap accompanied by her cousin Nasir, whom the men beat up and drove away. They took her to a nearby garden. According to media reports, she was gang-raped, allegedly by ten of her abductors. All BCL activists. More recently, in February 2010, four students of Chittagong Medical College, all BCL leaders and activists, allegedly raped a girl on a hill adjoining the CMC campus.
   

Young women, who are either university students, or walking through campuses, have complained of being physically assaulted by BCL activists. In early November, a Rajshahi university student was assaulted and confined for an hour. One of the assaulters was Kawsar Hossain, a fellow student of the same university who had declared his love for her but had been turned down. A similar incident had occurred several months earlier, on the same campus, when another BCL activist, accompanied by his associates, assaulted a woman student and her companion. On February 21, BCL activists beat up a young girl and her friends who were returning from the central Shaheed Minar, in front of the Dhaka University vice-chancellor's residence. A BCL activist of Jasimuddin Hall approached the young girl, and began harassing her. Her companions and passersby came to her aid but other BCL activists, from nearby halls, joined in the attack. Five people were injured. This month, in April, students of statistics department of Jagannath University refused to attend classes until a BCL activist, who had reportedly assaulted a woman student belonging to their department, was punished.
   

What is wrong with the BCL? Or, more precisely, what wrongs do its leaders and their followers commit? Violence. Extortion. Tenderbaji. Sexual offences are never mentioned. Not by the prime minister, nor by any high (let alone, low-) ranking AL member. It is an offence that has no name. And therefore, it does not exist. If it does not exist, its existence need not be acknowledged... That is how denial has worked. And at the ground level, someone or the other obliges, whether it be party functionaries. Or local-level police. Or the college principal. For instance, in the case of Pakhimara, where the gang-rape occurred, local-level AL leaders fined the 16 young men 10,000 taka each for having 'tortured' the girl. Their offence was characterised as 'intent to rape'. Not gang-rape, no. The victim's family was forced to declare this at a hurriedly called press conference. Forced to file a defamation case against the publisher, editor and reporter of a Bangla daily for having reported the rape as rape. AL leaders pressurised the editor of a local daily to sack his reporter for having reported the rape. The culprits were not arrested. The victim's family fled in fear of reprisal. The allegation of gang-rape had been manufactured to taint the ruling party's image, said Rakibul Ahsan, Kalapara upazila AL secretary.
   

In Pirojpur, Mamun was expelled from his post of information secretary. His membership was cancelled for life, but he, along with Monir, is still absconding. In Chittagong Medical College, an emergency academic council meeting suspended the four alleged rapists. News reports add, the identity of the girl was not known. Hence, no rape case was filed. In Rajshahi University, although Kawsar was expelled from the university, was imprisoned, he was still allowed to take his exams. On flimsy grounds. The departmental chairperson had not received his expulsion order from the university authorities. In Dhaka University, although BCL activists who caused assault and injury on February 21 have been suspended, they are still staying in the residential halls. Two have been given executive positions in the newly-formed BCL hall unit.
   

But after the Pahela Baishakh concert fiasco at Raju Chattar in Dhaka University, it has become increasingly harder to deny that which has no name. According to newspaper reports, 20 female students were molested. By BCL cadres. Also, by outsiders. Women concert-goers complained. They were pinched. Grabbed. Breasts. Buttocks. Two women students' kameezes were ripped, forcing them to accept shirts offered by male concert-goers, to cover themselves. Police rescued fifteen young women from among dense crowds, encircled by men. The concert was abruptly closed down as things threatened to get out of control. According to newspaper reports, groups of BCL activists had battled with each other over splitting 40 lakh taka given by a private mobile phone company. To DU BCL leaders, for having organised the concert. But no, the university authorities claimed not to know anything about it. Neither did the BCL leadership. No, they hadn't heard anything.
   

A Bangla proverb, shaak die maach dhaka, the (foolhardy) attempt to cover live fishes with spinach leaves, expresses well the attempts of DU authorities post-concert. The DU vice-chancellor, Professor AAMS Arefin Siddique, inaugurated a three-day Rover Scout campaign. Petitioning signatures. Processions. Rallies. The slogan? 'No to Eve teasing.' Surely this undermines last year's High Court ruling? A ruling which was heartily welcomed by women's organisations in Bangladesh. Any kind of physical, mental or sexual harassment of women, girls and children at their workplaces, educational institutions and at other public places, including roads, is a criminal offence punishable by fine and/or imprisonment. The ruling has the status of law. So where does this all this drivel about eve-teasing come from? As feminists have repeatedly pointed out, eve-teasing is a western and Christian construct, it refers to the temptress nature of Eve, thereby placing the responsibility for sexual harassment on women. On the victims, not the perpetrators. From earlier denial, looking-the-other-way, to victim-blaming? Is this the new AL strategy being fashioned by its ideologists? Why should women's organisations and women's rights activists who have struggled hard for women's right to public space for many long years be a party to undermining our hard-won HC ruling? One which we had all agreed was a 'revolution'?
   

There are other things that I find deeply troubling. The recent revelations sparked by squabbles over dividing the loot earned from admission profiteering at Eden Women's University College. According to newspaper reports, factions opposed to BCL unit president Jasmine Shamima Nijhum and general secretary Farzana Yasmin Tania have alleged that, besides admission profiteering, these women leaders are involved in tenderbaji, wheeling and dealing, buying up BTV slots, and lobbying. They use first year students, those from village backgrounds, telling them that this is the way to fulfil their dreams of becoming leaders, and becoming wealthy. The girls are encouraged to dress up. They are taken to the houses of different leaders. Sometimes to hotels. And asked to entertain them. According to the allegations, the BCL leaders leave the hostel after 10 at night. Returning the next day, at 10 in the morning. Women students who refuse to do as told are either turned out of the hostel, or their room is broken into, or locked up. The principal of the college, according to news reports, is fully complicit in these happenings.
   

Both Khaleda Zia, the leader of the opposition ('the girls of Eden college are being used to entertain the ministers and MPs whose salaries and allowances have been raised'), and Ali Ahsan Mohammad Mujahid, Jamaat secretary general ('women students are used to satisfy the leaders'), have capitalised on these stories, using them as opportunities to attack the government.
   

While AL apologists shush the leader of the opposition for having defiled the honour of 'all' students of Eden College for a bad apple or two, while a journalist friend tells me that one or two students of Eden have since retracted their statements, I return to my memories of Jahangirnagar University, to the anti-rape movement in 1998 when the university authorities, to quell the movement, had barked: which one among you have been raped? Come, stand up, be identified.
   

Hundreds of women students had spoken up in a single voice: we have all been dishonoured. The prime minister, her women cabinet ministers, and the leader of the opposition could take lessons from that.

 

http://www.newagebd.com/2010/apr/19/edit.html

__._,_.___

[Disclaimer: ALOCHONA Management is not liable for information contained in this message. The author takes full responsibility.]
To unsubscribe/subscribe, send request to alochona-owner@egroups.com

Your email settings: Individual Email|Traditional
Change settings via the Web (Yahoo! ID required)
Change settings via email: Switch delivery to Daily Digest | Switch to Fully Featured
Visit Your Group | Yahoo! Groups Terms of Use | Unsubscribe

__,_._,___