Mohammad Maniruzzaman
maniruz@gmail.com writes:
Muslims in Bangladesh are majority in number but in many indicators the Muslims are least advantaged and deprived.
In terms of occupation group which is a good indicator of deprivation any researcher would find that:
Most of the agricultural day labour, daily based construction labour, rickshaw drivers, garments workers etc are Muslims while salaried employees in the formal sectors - NGOs, government offices etc are represented more than proportionately by the Hindus, Buddhists and Christians. One may particularly note that majority of the top executives in significant number of NGOs are non-Muslims. Christians are less than one percent of Bangladesh population but the dominate in the NGO sector. Buddhists are less than one percent but they too dominate in NGOs and in several GOB agencies/ ministries.
Muslims are often blamed for converting Hindus to Islam but the fact is that most tribal people like the Gharos and Santals are now converted Christian. Conversion to Christianity is largely sponsored by large NGOs and missionaries in the name of humanitarian assistance and the targets have,
been lower caste Hindus and Tribal Communities.
If some one has doubt about the deprivation of the Muslims, one can just walk along the corridors of any Government office, NGO Office and read the name plates. One may also note the names of the top executives where one would find plenty of dada and didi (senior non-Muslim men and women) but few bhai and apa (senior Muslim men and women).
Why this has happened? There is a historical cause, back from the British period until about 1930s when Muslims were deprived of access to modern education, public service, business, large land holding and alike. Virtually almost all Muslims were peasants and almost all Zamindars were Hindus in the undivided Bengal. In the words of Clarance Maloney (American Anthropologist who was a development practitioner in Bangladesh more than a decade) East Bengal was a hinterland of Calcutta where Calcutta was a hinterland of Bombay and Bombay was a hinterland of England. East Bengali Muslim peasants were further subordinated to Bangalee caste Hindus and even of lower caste Hindus.
Abul Mansur Ahmed wrote in the very beginning of his famous book Aamar Dekha Rajnitir Ponchas Bochar (My View of the Fifty Years of Politics) noted that in the kachari (outer home or revenue collection centre of the zamindares Hindi Brahmins got chair, other caste Hindus had right to sit on the wooden bench, lower caste Hindus could sit on mat or sack but Muslims had to stand apart. Lowest grade of Hindus were "un-touchable" to the caste Hindus but Muslims were far inferior to this - even their shade was "impure" to damage their jati (Hindutya).
East Bengali Muslims after long struggle had a hope to political, economic as well as cultural empowerment with the partitioning of Bengal in 1905 but this was foiled by the caste Hindu movement, largely sponsored by the Calcutta based Hindu elites (Babu) who dominated politics in that part of the history. The Babus of Calcutta carried on movement against the establishment of just one University in the East Bengal and were able to block it about a decade from 1912 to 1921.
It is irony that the Muslims are branded communal and blamed for the partitioning of India which was really inevitable because of the discrimination against the Muslims over a period of about 200 years since the battle of Palasy (1757). The Muslims did not initially demand partitioning of India, what the demanded was proportionate representation in the state and Union Parliament, Cabinet, public service etc. They demanded democratic rights and justice which were denied for decades and centuries. Moulana Abul Kalam Azad (whose position was next to Gandhi's in the Indian National Congress) explained in his famous book India wins Freedom how and why India was divided and who were the culprits to make it inevitable - Nehru, Krishna Menon and Sarder Patel. In Bengal, Muslim leaders and schedule caste leaders mainly from East Bengal voted for undivided Bengal but the West Bengali elite Hindu leaders voted for partitioning of Bengal as they could not accept a situation where Muslims will be majority in the undivided Bengal.
This is again paradoxical that the Calcutta Babus denied partitioning of Bengal in 1905 but actually made it happen in 1947.
Since independence of Bangladesh in 1971 the Awami League came up with a funny idea of Mujibism which is actually "fascism and national betrayal" as was seen by the Jatiya Somajtantrik Dol. Mujibism which combines Democracy, Socialism, Bangalee Nationalism and Secularism is a rubbish hodgepodge putting together several contradictory, unacceptable and unimplementable ideas.
Mujibist secularism turned anti-Islamic. To the Mujibbadi secularists Islam is synonymous to fundamentalism, terrorism, backwardness, anti-independence, anti-women and alike. Islamic words are impure to them. They dislike saying Bismillah, Allah, Salam etc. Allah is wrongly translated as "shristi korta" or creator knowing fully well that Allah is not just a creator but far more than this. The secularists however do not forget to use religion in election campaign such as displaying their leader's photo in prayer with tosbih and jainamaj.
While the Awami Leaguers and many NGOs tend to deprive the Muslims they do not hesitate to favour non-Muslims while targeting development assistance.
There is a need to redefine development priorities and targeting criteria in Bangladesh considering the following facts:
* Literacy rate is much lower among the Muslims (about 40%) than Hindus (over 60%), Christians (about 100%) and in major tribes (Chakma/ Gharo over 80%).
* Poverty and extreme poverty are much higher among the Muslims than non-Muslims
* Most slum dwellers in the cities are Muslim
* About 95% of the agricultural labour and other unskilled workers working particularly in the unorganized sectors are Muslim. Even in the Hindu majority areas, one will find a Hindu rickshaw driver.
* Muslim women are more disadvantaged than non-Muslim women in terms of access to education and income earning opportunities.
M. Maniruzzaman
MA in Economics
PhD in Anthropology
A freelance development practitioner
'Minority Islam' in Muslim-majority Bangladesh
Nayan Khan <udarakash08@yahoo.com>
http://sonarbangladesh.com/blog/nayankhan/70038
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