by SHAHRIAR KABIR
The mass upsurge of Shahbag has passed 30 days. Not only at Shahbag, the people's rally has maintained continuity from Chittagong to Dinajpur and from Sylhet to Khulna, that is, in most of the districts, without any active support from any politcal party or any other organisation. Some of the foreign journalists have compared this spontaneous people's uprising with that of Tahrir Square of Egypt, some with the upsurge of Anna Hazare in India and the movement for occupation of Wall Street in New York.
Undoubtedly the aforementioned three recent upsurges of the USA, Egypt and India are epoch-making incidents. Like that of Dhaka all these great rallies continued for several days without any break. But the uprising of Shahbag differs from the others and is quite distinct, independent and important from the perspective of the recent historic incidents. First of all, like Tahrir Square the awakening-stage of Shahbag was started by the “Face Book generation”, but the Tahrir uprising had the surreptitious backing of the ‘Muslim Brotherhood' and a large section of the Egyption Army that wanted the downfall of President Hosni Mubarak. Similarly apart from civil society leaders, the main patrons of Anna Hazare's rally were the different sections of Hindu fundamentalists. And both the move-ments were anti-government in character.
The movement of Shahbag Square began on February 5, 2013 by independent young bloggers without any political attachment whatsoever. They claim themselves to be the children of Shahid Janani Jahanara Imam as they belong to the post-liberation war generation. This young generation has led a decade-long cyber-war for the trial of war criminals and the perpetrators of the 1971 genocide as well as their cohorts, that is, the other fundamentalist and communal forces. They have built up a global network for secular humanism. They are fighting for providing deterrent punishment to the war criminals and banning the religion-based politics of the Jamaat-Shibir clique. Twentyone years ago the civil society movement grew under the leadership of Shahid Janani Jahanara Imam with these two objectives and the main force of that movement was the young post-liberation war generation.
After the brutal killing of Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, the founder of Bangladesh, in 1975 when General Ziaur Rahman came to power, he outrightly stopped the trial of the war criminals and acquitted the convicts. By eliminating the history of the liberation war from the Constitution and also erasing the principles of Secularism, Bengali Nationalism and Socialism, he opened the door for the participation of the Jamaat and other Islamic fundamentalist parties in politics. General Zia attempted to take back Bangaldesh to the pre-liberation period and because of his ‘Pakistanisation' and so-called ‘Islamisation' policies the generation which grew up in the following dark decades did not know about the genocide and crimes against humanity committed during the liberation war of 1971. They did not even know who our friends and foes were. Twentyone years after the liberation war, the movement for resisting the killers and colla-borators of 1971, initiated by Jahanara Imam, stood against the ‘Pakistanisation' of our politics and society. The generation which has grown up through this movement is the main driving force of the Shahbag uprising and they are upholding the spirit of the liberation war, that is, secular humanism.
The movement of Shahbag is unlike the Tahrir Square and Arab Spring movements that wanted the downfall of governments. Behind the upsurges of Cairo and Delhi were the Muslim and Hindu fundamentalists respectively. The principal opponents of the Shahbag uprising are the religious fundamentalists headed by the Jamaat-e-Islami. During the Pakistani rule all democratic movements initiated by the Bengalis were dubbed as anti-Islam and anti-Pakistan by the Pakistani rulers and their agents like the Jamaat-e Islami. During the liberation war our freedom fighters were called the ‘enemy of Islam', ‘miscreants' and ‘Indian agents' by the Pakistani hordes. The Jamaat-e Islami and their like-minded Islamists are using the same language against the present patriotic bloggers of the Shahbag movement. They have brutally murdered a very active blogger, Rajib Hyder. They did not stop there. They are assassinating his character by calling him ‘murtad' (atheist) and also threatening his other compatriots that they too would meet the same fate.
One Maolana Shafi, the Principal of the Hatazari Madrasa, in an open letter published in the Daily Sangram, the mouthpiece of the Jamaat-e Islami, has issued a fatwa (edict), spread over half the publication's front page, that Shahriar Kabir, Professor Muntassir Mamoon and some other leaders of the Shahbag uprising are ‘murtad', ‘kafirs' (non-believers) etc. Twentyone years back they similarly hounded Shahid Janani Jahanara Imam, poet Sufia Kamal, writer Showkat Osman, Professor Kabir Chowdhury, Professor Ahmed Sharif, journalist Faiz Ahmed and other top-ranking leaders of the ‘Nirmul Committee' (Forum for Secular Bangladesh) in the same language and instigated their party workers to kill those renowned personalities. What started with a Supreme Court Judge, who belongs to Jamaat-e-Islami, and a couple of daily newspapers, some imposter religious bigots have joined a Jihad with the only object of foiling the war criminals' trial at any cost.
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THE six points declared from the Shahbag Square are not apparently for pulling down the govern-ment but constitute a strong warning to as well as a pressure upon the government in view of certain mismanagement in the process of the war criminals' trial. The ‘Nirmul Committee' has always urged the government to simultaneously try the criminal organisations and individuals, that is, those who were responsible for the genocide of 1971 but the Law Minister has all the time expressed his unwillingness to do so. We have all along insisted that if the organisations involved in the genocide are not tried side by side with the individuals, this trial will not be acceptable to the family members of the three million martyrs in particular and the people in general. But the authorities did not or could not realise this. When the other day the Prime Minister made an emotional statement in favour of the Shahbag uprising in Parliament, the Law Minster woke up from his slumber and introduce a bill for the trial of the organisations and it was duly passed. So far the issue of religion-based politics is concerned, different Ministers have made different comments. Finally on February 19, the Information Minister said that the government had no intention to ban religion-based politics.
Only the day before while addressing the Shahbag rally I said that religion-based politics cannot be banned without the full revival of the Constitution of 1972. On that occasion some anguished bloggers told me that their leaders have stopped the demand to ban religion-based politics. I consoled them by saying: there is no reason to believe that the government will accept all the demands at one go. If there would not have been the Shahbag upsurge the government would not have taken the decision of trying the Jamaat-e Islami as a criminal organisation. So definitely it is a great victory; the perception of your movement has spread throughout the length and breadth of the country. If politics in the name of religion is to be stopped, the country needs a strong, farsighted and bold leader like Banga-bandhu. Since we don't have such a leader right now even if this government bans the Jamaat-e-Islami that too will be a great victory for us.
The movement for a secular and democratic society in Bangladesh started since the language movement of 1952. The war of liberation began 19 years after the language movement at the call of Bangabandhu. The trial of Golam Azam was held in the ‘People's Court' set up by Jahanara Imam 21 years after the liberation. Again after 21 years, Imran, Pyal, Badhan, Asif, Arif, Niloy, Lucky and Rajib brought about a great awakening. The movement for building a secular and humane society will continue from generation to generation.
Just two weeks before the great upsurge of Shahbag Square on the occasion of the 21st birth anniversary of ‘Nirmul Committee', I wrote in an article on January 6, 2013 that the daily ‘Pratham Alo' conducted and published various public opinion survey reports on the occasion of the completion of four years rule of the great alliance government.
On two issues such as the trial of war criminals and banning the Jamaat-e-Islami—86 per cent replied in the affirmative in 2009 and that declined to 44 per cent in 2012.
In the survey conducted by Protham Alo it was also mentioned that 58 per cent had voted in favour of banning politics based on religion. I feel that if the question would have been specific about the banning of Jamaat-e-Islami's politics, 80 per cent would have supported the move. Many religious organisations and Ulamas (Islamic scholars) of the subcontinent including those in Bangladesh feel that the Jamaat has besmirched Islam in the name of religion. If a referendum is held on the issue of banning the Jamaat-e-Islami in Bangladesh there will be a massive vote in favour of the demand. But actually no referendum is required. The grand alliance led by Sheikh Hasina got the mandate in the election of 2008. If the policy-makers of the government do not realise this, we cannot but pity them.
My hope has been raised high by the great uprising of Shahbag Square led by the children of Jahanara Imam's movement. Today if a referendum is held on the issue of banning religion-based politics then I think that 80 per cent of the people will be in favour of such a ban. This is the greatest success of the new generation that has unveiled a new epoch at Dhaka's Shahbag Square.
(March 6, 2013)
The author, who is the General Secretary of the ‘Ekattorer Ghatak-Dalal Nirmul Committee (Committee to Exterminate the Killers and Collaborators of 1971)', is a noted columnist and intellectual of Bangladesh and an intrepid fighter against religious fanaticism and fundamentalism.