Arif is free

Drishtipat and E-Bangladesh are reporting that cartoonist Arif has been released from his six month incarceration. This blog promised to highlight his plight until justice was done. We now thank all those who helped Arif in his struggle: other bloggers, letter writers, petitioners, and most of all, Barrister Sara Hossain and her team. When the issue moved off the headlines, Sara and her team kept on fighting the lonely legal battles. This blog also notes the cowardice of our major editors, who disowned Arif in his hour of need, and who refused to publish any op-ed on the issue. And finally, we wish Arif well for his life ahead.

Between "Islam"ists and "Secular Human"ists - Caught in Between (and Needing Badly to Get Out): the World's Muslims! - Part 2

Please read Part 1 before this.

Ms. Nasrin and the "Secular Human"ists

So continuing on with my evening: after pondering the sheer hypocrisy of Islamists when it comes to turning a blind eye to the un-Islamic behaviour of their ideological allies, and re-affirming once again their inability to better the conditions of the world's Muslims, I decided to cool off by distracting myself.

A visit to The 3rd World View produced this real gem of a resource on the latest controversy surrounding Taslima Nasrin.

For those who do not know, Taslima Nasrin is a self-confessed secular humanist. This means that she is in support of the separation of church/temple/mosque/synagogue/whathaveyou and state.

Now while I do not subscribe to secular humanism (or Islamism), what I expect from the adherents of these ideologies is consistency. Plain and simple. Yesterday I highlighted how the controversies created by Islamists were hollow and self-serving, simply the opposite of Islam which values consistency and deliberation in judgement. Today, I will highlight how secular humanists of the Nasrin variety create controversies that are equally self-serving and without any consistency, but which have the unfortunate effects of demonising the world's Muslims to an increasingly suspicious non-Muslim audience.

Taslima Nasrin's writings against Islam what she experienced in the name of Islam at the hands of some Muslims are well-known. She has been living in exile since then, ironically in a country with more Muslims than in her home-country of Bangladesh - and yet her plight is constantly used as an instance of "Muslim intolerance" by vested quarters. The Indian government - normally so harsh on Bangladeshis immigrating to its territory - has continuously given her visa extensions. (I leave readers to draw their own conclusions. Frankly, Bangladesh's response should have been to offer asylum to M.F. Husain, but then our "national security" warriors worriers don't like paintings of Hindu goddesses either, do they? Damn, we BADLY need a good debate about national security that is free of communal dynamics!)

What really screamed out at me from the 3rd World View post linked above however was this particular newspiece:

Bangladeshi author Taslima Nasreen, in hiding in India after death threats from Islamic groups, has found an ally in a hardline Hindu leader accused of collusion in the killing of Muslims during religious riots in 2002.

Gujarat chief minister Narender Modi has invited the author to stay in his western state after she fled Marxist-ruled West Bengal last week, the Economic Times newspaper reported Tuesday.

"She is welcome to come and stay in Gujarat. She can carry on her work in the field of literature and serve mankind," Modi was quoted as saying in an interview to the paper.

"Even if she criticises me in her book, I will welcome it."

"Never underestimate the impudence of an impudent man", to paraphrase an unmarried Christian woman on a small island off the coast of Europe (and I can't wait to find out how the Jamaatis spin that one tomorrow!). It went through my head as I imagined Modi being so magnanimous to a critic of Islam.

For those who don't know, Narendra Modi was the godfather behind the genocide (the ONLY word) of Muslims in Gujarat in 2002. What started off as commmunal rioting was transformed into ethnic cleansing thanks to the government of Gujarat's then chief minister, Narendra Modi. RSS "volunteers" roamed free with voters' list furnished by the government showing where Muslims lived. The state and the police were complicit in this massacre of a people based on their religion. And the victims were Muslim. The latest from the investigation into Gujarat comes from Tehelka (h/t Tacit).

I think it is pretty clear that Narendra Modi's dislike for "Muslims" stems from a very different source than Taslima Nasrin's. Yet, their dislike brings them together - (just as, in our country, a hatred for the centre-left makes far-left eccentrics like Farhad Mazhar write for far-right newspapers like Naya Diganta).

But this is not my real disappointment with Ms. Nasrin. I am not as thin-skinned as some people who call themselves Muslim. I do not really give a **** what cartoons are being published or who wrote what in which third-rate novel. If someone's written against Islam: fine, whatever. I have many more productive ways to follow Islam in everyday life (prayer, good deeds, fundraising for some cyclone victims, alms, a few polemics against Islamists) than to take up some placard and waste half my day.

No my real disappointment with Ms. Nasrin lies in the fact that in all her years in India, very rarely have I heard her speak against the religious fundamentalism of the Sangh Parivar and its affiliates. I have not found any utterance by her against the Gujarat Genocide, the censoring and "voluntary" exile of M.F. Husain, the censoring of and RSS-backed protetsts against the film Final Solution on the Gujarat Massacres by Rakesh Sharma. I emphasise, I have not found and if you know of any, I will put in the correction. Indeed, the only criticism she has ventured against any of the RSS's pet projects have been her support for Deepa Mehta's film "Water" (one of my favourite movies), whose filming was stopped by threats from religious fundamentalists. The movie is about the lives of Hindu widows in the backdrop of Indian's independence, and has nothing to do with Muslims.

So basically, secular-humanists of the Nasrin, Rushdie or the Hitchens variety really say a lot by their selective silence on and selective speeches against some religions more than others. Wrongs are done in the name of all religions, yet Islam what they think is "Islam" always comes in for more than it's share of flak for a lot of reasons.

And this flak by secular humanists can then be used by bigots like Modi to de-humanise Muslims, disenfranchise them and in extreme cases like Gujarat, wipe them off completely. One can then invite a secular-humanist with a beef against Muslims to "criticise away" with no problem whatsoever!

If Taslima Nasrin actually takes up that offer, I'll be more than happy to retract this blog post and put up "I was wrong" in big, bold letters. But she won't. Firstly, because as an author she is terribly narrow: she can only write about her personal experience and her personal tragedy and those were inflicted on her by Muslims. Secondly because her world-view is such that "religious fundamentalism" is always worse than fundamentalism in the name of the nation. The RSS never simply presents themselves as a religious outfit, but as a nationalist one as well, all about restoring Bharat to an imagined pristine state before the Muslims and Christians "sullied" it. She'll buy it as an instance of "secular" nationalism, just as V.S. Naipaul did. Thirdly, who exactly is going to bite the hand that's sheltering them? (Hint: people with integrity)

And that, dear readers, is how I came to the conclusion that Muslims worldwide are being screwed over - by "Islam"ists who really care about certain policies rather than Islam or Muslims; and by "secular human"ists whose humanism is not magnanimous enough to care about Muslims, 1/6 of the world's human population. Attendant caveats as always: not all Islamists are like this and neither are all secular humanists. And thankfully most of the world's populaton, let alone most of the world's Muslims do not fall into these two blindingly rigid categories. That is what gave me some hope as I tended to my throat. But I admit, not a lot.

Concluding remarks: such "secular human"ists and "Islam"ists have certain traits in common. As I've said before: neo-cons/"secular human"ists and Islamists have a monolithic view of Islam. Their view of Islam is that of an intolerant, illiberal, stupefying dogma (a view that serves both their interests) rather than the tolerant, merciful, moderate and sympathetic religion that was once the driving engine of several cosmopolitan empires.

Lastly, they both need each other. Both need each other to get rid of the ideological adversaries within their own communities, namely "domestic" liberals. "Secular human"ists need to point to Islamists in order to convince REAL liberals that "Muslims" are simply different, they neither understand nor deserve any response but the brute force and torture that liberals frown upon. (And if they get those from non-secular communalists like Modi, well "All's well that ends well".) When REAL liberals refuse to agree, well then it's easy to paint them as "terrorist sympathisers", "appeasers" and "liberal wimps who empathise too much with other cultures" etc etc. Although the word "over-smartness" is yet to be used, the connotations are there among neo-cons and their apologists.

On the other hand, Islamists take liberals within Muslim communities to task using these "secular human"ists as examples of "liberals". Thus the Daily Star becomes an "Islamophobic" paper to them and Zafar Sobhan's adherence to Islam is questioned by them, even though a few weeks back, Zafar Sobhan had this to say about a particularly sordid neo-con venture. In other words, all domestic liberals are "neo-cons/Islamophobes" to Islamists. Even when they are Muslims!

In between, a large swath of the world's population is left to rot in ignorance and poverty and insecurity. Maybe for generations to come.

This post would not have been possible without two posts by The 3rd World View and Bonbibi, both of whose writing prove them to be much better humanists and humans than the ones I've criticised here.

Between "Islam"ists and "Secular Human"ists - Caught in Between (and Needing Badly to Get Out): the World's Muslims! - Part 1

Part 1 - Mr. X and the Islamists

Let me guide you through my evening today.

I come home, coughing once every three seconds, pissed at my lungs, pissed at the world. I go online and see that Zafar Sobhan's newest piece posted on UV is causing quite a storm (admittedly in a tea-cup). At the very top is a commenter - lets call him/her/it Mr. X - who has a habit of giving us rare gems and does not disappoint in this case either.

Unfortunately Zafar Sobhan has started off this piece with a quote that he attributed to the Talmud, which Wikipedia informs us is "a record of rabbinic discussions pertaining to Jewish law, ethics, customs, and history".

Mr. X says:

Zafar Sobhan citation from the Talmud in the very first line of the thread, “He who saves one life, saves the world entire. –Talmud” is the manifestation of his inferiority complex [Hinaumonnatar shamil]. Because the very same quotation is present in Al-Quran saying more eloquently as,” Je Keho Ekjon Niraporad Manushke Hautta Korlo She Je Shamogra Manab Jaalti ke Hautta Korlo. Aar Je Keho Ekjon Mansusher Jibon Bachalo, She jen Shamogra Manab Jaatike Bachalo.”

I wonder why Mr. Zafar cited from the Holy Book of the Jews overlooking his own Holy Book. Doesn’t it point to bankruptcy of wisdom of the author?

Many people respond to Mr. X including yours truly. I will, with full admission of my own vanity and pride, reproduce my response because it has a bearing on what we are discussing. I responded to him thus:

"______ is right as far as the quotation from the Quran is concerned. And Farhad bhai, thank you for saying what I was about to say.

Now with full apologies to the moderators, I would like to take this occasion to rant a little bit about those who quote the Quran to suit their own ideological ends. ESPECIALLY when the full quote is absent. If you feel this comment too detracts from the point of the post, feel free to moderate it out.

The quote comes from the 32nd ayat of the 5th Surah in the Quran “Al Mai’da” or “The Table/The Table Spread” (Yusuf Ali). The full ayat is this courtesy of Yusuf Ali:

On that account: We ordained for the Children of Israel that if any one slew a person - unless it be for murder or for spreading mischief in the land - it would be as if he slew the whole people: and if any one saved a life, it would be as if he saved the life of the whole people. Then although there came to them Our apostles with clear signs, yet, even after that, many of them continued to commit excesses in the land.

Now the questions posed by me for _______ and the theologians are three-fold:

(1) when the man is trying to do a good thing through his writing, does it matter what book he quotes and does the Holy Quran itself prescribe bringing up UNNECESSARY arguments instead of pursuing the right course of action during catastrophes like this?

(2) When the Holy Quran itself says that such a message came to the “Children of Israel”, is Zafar Sobhan’s quoting of it from that source a sin/crime? (Think very carefully before you answer)

(3)Why wasn’t the ayat from the Holy Quran quoted in full in #1? Feel free not to answer this."

Now here's where it gets really interesting. Mr. X comes back with this gem of a response, which I cannot reproduce in its entirety thanks to its length. But I will quote the parts I found most relevant:

Thank you folks for your comments on my comment about the quote from Talmud. I believe in religion, ain’t an atheist. I have respect for Thalmud and other heavenly books. I believe, the three religions, their books and their followers are just like sibling to each other. I have profound respect to all of them. But I want to emphysize here the teaching ” Know thyselves.” Many a times we try to show up our over-smartness and expanse of knowledge by following, citing and using non-indeginous exotic stuff.

...... But contention is that we have some elites who being muslim doesn’t have good study on Islam and quite uncomfortable with own religion but feel comfortable to affiliate with others and start reading, Geeta, bible, talmud etc and start criticizing his own one.

Once again I emphasize that this has little to do with this particular commenter. I do not like to pick on denizens of the Bangladeshi blogs, even ones for whom I have very little sympathy.

No rather, I'd like to present this commenter as the model poster child of a particular Deshi mindset and dissect his comments to see what insights we can glean into this mindset.

Firstly, let me zero-in on the most problematic part of this little blog-drama I witnessed this evening. Zafar Sobhan quoting the Talmud is an example of "show up our over-smartness and expanse of knowledge by following, citing and using non-indeginous (sic) exotic stuff". The commenter in the immediately preceding sentence also says: "But I want to emphysize (sic) here the teaching ” Know thyselves (sic).”"

Does anyone know where the aphorism "Know thyself" comes from? Yes, the "classical" Greeks themselves. Now unless the Greeks were indigenous to Bangladesh and/or secretly Muslim since 610 -12 a.h., I am afraid that this is more "citing and using non indeginous (sic) exotic stuff". It really doesn't get more exotic than Greek philosophers....

Now here is the really interesting part: while the "secular celebrity intellectual" quoting the Talmud allegedly betrays a discomfort with his own religion, it is absolutely fine for this commenter to "emphysize here the teaching "Know Thyselves"". Even though, may I point out, that if you were to approach this from a strictly Islamic perspective: either both are guilty or both are innocent. From a deshi SECULAR legal perspective: either both are guilty or both are innocent. The same law applies to both.

Why is this important? Let me spell it out for those who don't know my little obsession nowadays: while a "secular" cartoonist like Arifur drawing that cartoon is an insult against religion and the Prophet (SAW), and betrays some sort of "conspiracy against Islam"; the Shibir-backed newspapers' publishing of the same cartoon is an example of .... nothing! It goes unremarked. It goes scot-free. No HuT members protesting there. No idiot commenters busy questioning their "motives" there (the worst I heard was that this was Arif's ticket out of Bangladesh - which revealed more of the commenter than the cartoonist).

Yet, it is the same whether we like it or not. But not condemned in the same way by those who always seem to speak for "Islamic" interests.

And here's the really interesting part. The "average" deshi middle-class dude(ette?) who's not really into religion or politics will - given the evidence of both - probably agree that Zafar Sobhan/Arifur's "digressions" are somehow greater than that of a Mr. X/Shibir-backed publication. Note, not Islamists who are exploiting the situation, but the average Mintoo who smokes his cigarette at the corner tea-shop while ogling the women and then goes to pray Jummah. He doesn't really like these mullahs (they'll get rid of the women from the streets), but he's not really a fan of these high-flying "intellectual" types either.

And here's why: because he has been convinced that there is this secret "cabal" composed solely of liberals who are out to "get Islam". AND MORE IMPORTANTLY, he has been convinced that "Islam" is only those set of practices and only those opinions that belong to a specific set of people, namely those who have beards and are quoting the Quran in parts to justify illiberal policies or whatever those in power want them to justify or - as was the case here - to villify someone they don't like. Helping the poor, the weak and the defenseless - those are not Islamic until and unless blessed by an appropriate man (always a man) with a beard wearing an alkhalla.

And if the bearded man tomorrow pronounces Zafar Sobhan to be a "heretic" while simultaneously preaching friendship with the "people of the Book"... well that isn't something for Mintoo to think about is it? If the bearded man says that Prothom Alo is a secular paper and so its printing of the cartoon is "haraam" and Kishore Kontho is a religious paper and its printing of the same cartoon is "halal", then that becomes "Islam" for Mintoo. After all, bearded men know "Islam". "Intellectuals" know only what the West has taught them.

Mr. X also very revealingly calls Mr. Sobhan "some elites who being muslim doesn’t have good study on Islam and quite uncomfortable with own religion but feel comfortable to affiliate with others and start reading, Geeta, bible, talmud etc and start criticizing his own one". The key-word here is "elite". I have also seen similar comments on tacit's blog (let's call this one Mr. Y). So perhaps it is an elite-resentment thing? Zafar Sobhan is seen to be part of some sort of elite and so his crimes mean so much more than others? Is that the logic at work? (Alas, if we only treated our power elites this way, we would have some accountability! But that is another matter.)

But then I had to ask, how does this apply to Arifur? Is he part of some secret elite that I am not aware of? As far as I knew, he was a simple Muslim boy from a simple pious family that named him after the Prophet (SAW). His only "sin" is to work for a newspaper that the Islamists deem to be "secular" and draw cartoons for them. Thus he is locked up. A Muslim man locked up. Without trial, without justice, without a fair hearing. For nothing but politics, but it is your vocal Muslims who are busy defending this in the name of Islam and it is your silent Muslims (the Mintoos) who are busy acquiescing to it.

At that point in the evening, I recalled a lot of people.

I recalled the Muslim Kurds - Sunni like 90%+ of this blog's Muslim readers - who were being oppressed by the Turks and the Iraqi and Syrian Arabs without many Islamists making noise about it (Amreeka and Nastik Communists were their preffered targets then). Indeed, one remembers how during the First Gulf War, Saddam was a hero to many, prayed for in the mosques.

I recalled Muslim Balochis killed by the Pakistani government without question while the Islamists made noise about other things (Yahya's drinking? Bhutto's womanising? The APWA? Who knows, who can tell? Why talk about human suffering when appealing to men threatened by women's emancipation from their homes is so much easier?).

I recalled black Muslim Sudanese being killed (and years before that, traded as slaves) by other Muslims and Islamists never holding a protest rally in Dhaka about that (cartoons, American invasion of Iraq and Aghanistan were more important then)

And of course I recalled how when this green land's Muslims were being killed along with their countrymen of other religions, what Islamists had done or not done.

And I came to one conclusion that was just beyond the tip of my nose: Islamists cannot take care of the world's Muslims, the majority of whom are coming to define the "third world" today (Asian Tigers and BRIC countries are ahead; oil-rich countries hold a tiny fraction of the world's Muslims). They cannot take care of those Muslims because THEY DO NOT CARE ABOUT THE WORLD'S MUSLIMS. They simply care for what they call their "religious duty" but what the rest of us can easily see as nakedly self-serving politics that benefits only one group: them. And if you don't see this, that's probably because you are an Islamist yourself. The rest of us can pretty clearly see that the emperor has no clothes.

Lastly, to end on a less than serious note, let me pin down one word that occurs in both Mr. X and Mr. Y's comments: "smartness". Typically a word used in Bangla to denote those who know too much about other cultures or to chastise children/teenagers, typically those who do not set store by society's limits on their behaviour. In English, it is actually quite complimentary. It smacks of having once been what James C. Scott would have labelled "a weapon of the weak".

Apparently, quoting the Talmud is an indication of "smartness". So are Yiddish proverbs and Vedic scripture according to Mr. Y (good for Mr. Sobhan that the Talmud is originally in Hebrew). So be it. I suppose the average Deshi hates it the same way the average American hates those Hollywood liberals getting into kaballah or the average Victorian hated the Buddhism fad of the 1890s. Or the way I hate those big thick glasses on hipsters.

The difference is: I don't advocate jail for everything I dislike. If that were true, I'd be calling for banning Jamaat right now.

Part 2: Ms. Nasrin and the "Secular Human"ists

Guest Post: Jamaat's Sudden Shift

While the blogosphere puzzles over Jamaat's sudden and vocal shift from "national reconciliation" into complete denial of any crimes committed in 1971, Mahmud Farooque bhai made some interesting comments on the same thread, which I'm reproducing below. So far we Kremlin-watchers bloggers have speculated that Jamaat's increased boldness was thanks to regime support, either because the regime is also Jamaati (highly implausible) or because the regime wanted to create a diversion while taking over BNP (more probable). Mahmud bhai provides a fresh perspective, especially his linking of the "midnight coup" within BNP and Jamaat's sudden boldness.

A mere speculation on my part would lead me to think that perhaps in the game of high stake poker, Jamaat took a calculated gamble to force the General to show his hand. The anti-AL vote has been up for grabs ever since BNP supporters deserted the Tareq Zia camp in favor of the Moinuddin bandwagon. Jamaat could be trying to establish itself as an alternative to AL. The effort to shore up BNP could then be an attempt to counter Jamaat. This may have been in the books, but Jamaat’s well orchestrated media blitz triggered the backup plan into immediate action, providing us with all the drama and the theatrics! DS and PA did not hold back any punches this time around, although they have been absolutely mum about the CTG/Army's misadventures. One would then imagine that they have the administration's blessings in having a cleansed BNP appear as a counter weight to Jamaat as opposed to having Jamaat solidify its role as a default alternative to AL.

I don’t think the audience for Jamaat’s current disinformation campaign is the elite or civil society constituency that is vocal in the general media and the Internet. Jamaat would be ecstatic to be able to simply run out the clock in that particular game, because they are more interested in winning the war.

What they get to do here is frame the debate and draw their opposition into an argument that they firmly believe will not see a resolution in the courts. That would be enough for them to win the war through their non-elite constituency by feeding the anti-AL block just enough disinformation to accept them as the default opposition to all things Indian, non-Muslim, US, NGO, Women empowerment, progressive, democratic, etc.

Now let me elaborate why I think that despite the favorable comments from the CA in the media, no trial for the war criminals will be allowed to happen at least under its watch. You know some of us have been growing crazy during the last ten months trying to figure out the ideological and political leanings of the Army backed CTG. I guess instead of looking at them through those lenses, an alternate approach could be to view them simply as the “serious gondogol (conflict, unrest, agitation, etc.) avoidance cooperative”. The continuation of the emergency, the stifling of any voice of dissent either in the media or in the public domain, the dismantling of the ‘gondogol-wing’ of the two major political parties, the DU crackdown, Arif arrest, snooping and eavesdropping into private conversations, etc. do not necessarily reveal a consistent ideology or principle except for the desire to diffuse or preempt any developing situation of possible conflict and exercise control to stave off any possibility of widespread unrests that could bring about a change in the government.

I believe someone mentioned that Jamaat hardly does anything by impulse. If that is true, their decision to seize the moment, perhaps, could be taking into account something similar to what I have elaborated above.

A similar analysis is tacit's post, which speculates that Jamaat might be asked to be the loyal opposition against some sort of centre-left King's party.

Shubho Bijoya

Shubho Bijoya!



Image courtesy of Ishtiaque Zico used under Creative Commons Licence.

The Cartoon Saga One Month Later - Some (More) Thoughts on the Secular-Religious Divide

It is exactly one month since Arifur Rahman's arrest. 30 days. Arif has spent the better part of Ramadan in prison and has spent Eid away from his family. Even his exact whereabouts are open to question.

Let me take a moment here to note the absolute silence about him in the mainstream media. A-B-S-O-L-U-T-E.

Ask yourself: is this what the Prophet (SW) would have prescribed? Given the stories of his sense of generosity, forgiveness and JUSTICE we all grow up with, the answer would have to be a resounding "no"! But of course, this will fall on the deaf ears of the people who use the Prophet's (SW) name explicitly (and that means YOU Hizb-ut-Tahrir!).

I have complained previously about how "secularists" drive an unnatural wedge between the religious sphere and every other sphere of life. Let me say here that I've always regarded this is a two-way process: ek haathey shottiyi taali baajey na! Religious people - and Islamists in particular - drive just such a wedge by barring a cartoonist from speaking about religion (or in this case, what passes for religious practice in Bangladesh).

When you bar your creative people from talking about religion, you cannot then come back and complain that they have become "so secular and worldly"!

Free Arifur Rahman and let him live with security and dignity.

Eid Mubarak!

.....and for expatriates missing the Eid atmosphere - and perhaps family and friends back home - here's some small consolation or maybe further aggravation of your nostalgia:



I tried to get the one with the little kids signing and swaying that we're used to watching on BTV to make it perfect. But you can't complain too much about Ferdousi Rahman and Shakila Zafar singing this classic.

I wish you all - Muslims-non-Muslims, Bangladeshis-non-Bangladeshis, expatriates and delta-dwellers - Eid Mobarok!

Burmese Days

First off, "Burma" or "Myanmar"? As we know, this goes beyond mere semantics, into ethical dilemmas.

Agree with a criminally stupid American President - I mean, part of me suspects that all this is simply because he can't pronounce "Myanmar" or doesn't know whether it's "Myamarian" or "Myanmarese"?

Laugh at the Orwellian situation of the current British Prime Minister declaring "the age of impunity" is over about a few months after his war criminal of a predecessor left the scene with the impunity that only the powerful enjoy?

What is the appropriate balance between helping the powerless out and ensuring that we ourselves do not align with the hegemonic project that weakens them further in the long run?

Secondly, as a firm secularist who believes in the separation of religion and politics, I would like to applaud the Burmese regime for going into the monasteries and mercilessly beating up these impertinent RELIGIOUS monks full of medieval ancient ideas who are telling these honourable, expert, MODERN men how to run their country.

Anyone who's a regular at this blog knows exactly how much sarcasm went into the above. I'd laugh if the situation were a bit less dire. But our own "secularists" better come up with an explanation if they want to support the Burmese democracy movement.

But I suppose this explains one perplexing question at least: why India has remained silent. Obviously, the world's biggest democracy does not want to sacrifice its "real practice of secularism". I'm kidding of course: Indian realpolitik would embarrass Machiavelli. Or Chanakya for that matter!

Thirdly, (and this relates thematically with my first point), BBC reports:

"In a sign that the military junta is afraid of foreign radio and satellite TV coverage of the protests and the crackdown, the state-run media has begun to blame foreign media for inciting the trouble.

The Light of Myanmar newspaper said: "Saboteurs from inside and outside the nation and some foreign radio stations, who are jealous of national peace and development, have been making instigative acts through lies to cause internal instability and civil commotion."

Any parallels with Bangladesh and the rhetoric emanating from a certain Barrister gifted with Extra-Conspiracy-Perception (ECP) is of course unintentional. Last thing I want is to have this blog blocked by people with heightened ECP.

Fourthly, and with all seriousness, let us acknowledge one simple truth: a "government" that fires on its own people loses its right to rule. Maybe not all at once, but certainly incrementally. Power might derive from the barrel of a gun, but legitimacy derives over ensuring that obedience to power is not completely against the interests of those supposed to be obeying. And legitimacy, not power, is what ensures longevity and leads to prosperity.

Just something to think about.....

Free Arifur Rahman NOW!

The Front Page will highlight cartoonist Arifur Rahman's incarceration until justice is done

Click here for the latest posts.

WRITE A LETTER TO ARIF. FOR DETAILS, SEE BELOW.

(This is the front page of the blog and will remain so as long as the cartoonist is denied justice and media coverage. For the latest content, please click on the link at the very top. Watch this post for updates.)

Early February: I am sad to report that the earlier reports of Arif being freed quietly by the regime is false. I am informed that he seems to be in good spirits, and is in a cell with one other
person. I understand that a petition has been moved to discharge him from the case for hurting religious sentiment (now pending before Dhaka Magistrate's Court) on the gruond that:

- there was no basis to the case,

- he had no such intention,

- he was not responsible for publication of the cartoon,

- the cartoon was not offensive,

- Islam preaches tolerance and fprgiveness, and

- he has in any event apologised for any inadvertent offence caused to anyone.

I also understand that his legal team pleaded procedural points of error.

I am informed that a decision is expected on 25th Feb.

Early January 2008: I am informed that Arif has been freed quietly by the regime, and his well wishers want the issue to be not highlighted. Shada Kalo is also reporting similarly.

October 22nd: I am happy to report that unlike a few weeks back, the blogs are now reporting that Arifur Rahman is not in some "undisclosed location", but rather at Dhaka Central Jail. Unheard Voices has begun a letter writing campaign for the jailed cartoonist. Please write to him to show your support and solidarity at this trying time in his young life. The letters can be addressed to:

Mohammad Arifur Rahman,
Son of Mohammad Matiur Rahman,
re CR Case No. 2298/07,
Dhaka Central Jail,
Nazimuddin Road,
Dhaka.

I would like to request my fellow bloggers to highlight this letter-writing campaign as well, especially in Bangla blogs. I'm almost ashamed to ask more from them given superb job they've done since our local media lost all its spine in dealing with this issue!

One particular line from the UV post is worth quoting: "We also urge those offended by the cartoon to write to him, for compassion towards one’s adversaries is a fast-vanishing Islamic value in today’s world."

Very few will disagree with that.

October 17th: It is exactly one month since Arifur Rahman's arrest. 30 days. Arif has spent the better part of Ramadan in prison and has spent Eid away from his family. Even his exact whereabouts are open to question.

Let me take a moment here to note the absolute silence about him in the mainstream media. A-B-S-O-L-U-T-E.

Ask yourself: is this what the Prophet (SW) would have prescribed? Given the stories of his sense of generosity, forgiveness and JUSTICE we all grow up with, the answer would have to be a resounding "no"! But of course, this will fall on the deaf ears of the people who use the Prophet's (SW) name explicitly (and that means YOU Hizb-ut-Tahrir!).

I have complained previously about how "secularists" drive an unnatural wedge between the religious sphere and every other sphere of life. Let me say here that I've always regarded this is a two-way process: ek haathey shottiyi taali baajey na! Religious people - and Islamists in particular - drive just such a wedge by barring a cartoonist from speaking about religion (or in this case, what passes for religious practice in Bangladesh).

When you bar your creative people from talking about religion, you cannot then come back and complain that they have become "so secular and worldly"!

Free Arifur Rahman and let him live with security and dignity.

October 1st update: Keep Me Honest has a must-read piece on the cartoonist. Turns out that he recently won a contest for the best cartoon against corruption, this current government's raison d'etre.

The list of bloggers in the September 28th update will be regularly updated. So please keep posting about this issue until justice is assured.

28th September update To my knowledge, the following bloggers have issued calls for the release of the cartoonist Arifur Rahman:

Shourav of Somewherein - The creator of the sticker you see above and on the sidebar, and his personal blog.

Addafication which highlighted the injustice of it all.

Mash

Third World View

Voice of Bangladeshi Bloggers

In the Middle of Nowhere, who rightfully asks us not to forget the BRAC worker kidnapped in Afghanistan either!

Serious Golmal

Unheard Voices

Tacit

Keep Me Honest.

Mukti

Shada Kalo

Royeshoye

I'd like to thank Sid and Rezwan bhai for most of the bloggers on this list.

If you are a blogger who has written about Arifur Rahman's predicament, called for his release or even simply put that sticker up, I would highly appreciate you leaving a comment here with the link to your blog/post. Same goes if you know someone who has. I'd like to highlight the bloggers who are doing all this. Thanks.

26th September

I'm too middle-class to go out into the streets and protest for anyone's release, I confess. There are many notables languishing in jail right now for whom the clarion cry of "Nishortey Mukti Chai" will be raised no doubt, once the CTG relaxes the ban on politics. I have not joined them on this blog till now and I will not join them in the future.

But when I see a 23-year old BANGLADESHI civilian being picked up and thrown into jail for no reason but that he offended some old men with decrepit ideas, I see injustice of the vilest sort. And protesting injustice, ESPECIALLY when it affects the weak, is a fundamental part of my religion.

It's been late in coming, but the realisation has finally hit those of us who still think independently. Last week Addafication wrote clearly as to why this was less about censorship and more about injustice. Today I found this post on Or How I Learned to Stop Worrying, highlighting the growing web campaign to free this artist.

Very few times in your life will you come across an act whose darkness can completely drown out the bright light of justice. This is one of those times. Raise your voices.

Islamists and Secularists - Here's Another Pickle

For people who want more religion in government (and you know who you are!), here's something to think about.

Oh, also meant for people who believe in "secular" governments, which the Chinese government unapologetically is.

Missing Women and Missing Arguments

"Western" pundits regularly castigate something they understand to be Islam for "its" attitude towards women (and Hitchens is by no means the best example, I'm feeling particularly lazy).

Today, I revisited something that Amartya Sen (the fourth or fifth greatest Bangali after Mujib, Zia, Sher-e-Bangla and arguably Dr. Yunus) brought to light 17 long years ago: missing women. Revisited in the form of a BBC story on a family from the Other partitioned province.

Two partitioned provinces. Two "nations". Two religions. Same attitude towards women. Yet, "culture", poverty, education are never singled out by anyone as potential factors for discrimination against women, except of course geniuses like Dr. Sen.

Religion is. Islam to a greater extent because of its unique position at the intersection of the Western political zeitgeist and Hindutva propaganda. Hinduism also, but to a lesser extent due to the absence of a global media consensus on it, and India's own "secular" self-image.

A secularism that has done NOTHING for women.

Lesson of the piece: Say "Islam is detrimental to women" and feel all sexy inside as the applause trickles in. Real scholars challenge orthodoxies.

Said vs. Neo-Cons/Global Jihadist

Treat this as a continuation of the last post. The "/" slash up there is meant to be literal as well as visual. Neo-cons and jihadists are after all two sides of the same coin, building up the great, giant monoliths of "Islam" and "the West". Here to provide some corrective surgery to these ugly distortions is the late Edward Said.

Three excerpts:

"Even the normally sober British weekly The Economist, in its issue of 22-28 September, can't resist reaching for the vast generalisation and praises Huntington extravagantly for his "cruel and sweeping, but nonetheless acute" observations about Islam. "Today," the journal says with unseemly solemnity, Huntington writes that "the world's billion or so Muslims are 'convinced of the superiority of their culture, and obsessed with the inferiority of their power'." Did he canvas 100 Indonesians, 200 Moroccans, 500 Egyptians, 50 Bosnians? Even if he did, what sort of sample is that?" ...

"This is the problem with unedifying labels like Islam and the West: they mislead and confuse the mind which is trying to make sense of a disorderly reality that won't be pigeonholed or strapped down as easily as all that. I remember interrupting a man who had risen from the audience after a lecture I had given at a West Bank University in 1994 and had started to attack my ideas as "Western," as opposed to the strict Islamic ones he espoused. "Why are you wearing a suit and tie?" was the first simpleminded retort that came to mind; "they're Western too." He sat down with an embarrassed smile on his face, but I recalled the incident when information on the 11 September terrorists started to come in, how they had mastered all the technical details required to do their homicidal evil on the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and the aircraft they had commandeered. Where does one draw the line between "Western" technology and, as Berlusconi declared, "Islam's" inability to be a part of "modernity." ...

"But we are all swimming in those waters, Westerners and Muslims and others alike. And since the waters are part of the ocean of history, trying to plough or divide them with barriers is futile. These are tense times, but it is better to think in terms of powerful and powerless communities, the secular politics of reason and ignorance, and universal principles of justice and injustice, than to wander off in search of vast abstractions that may give momentary satisfaction but little self-knowledge or informed analysis. The "clash of civilizations" thesis is a gimmick, like "The War of the Worlds," better for reinforcing defensive self-pride than for critical understanding of the bewildering interdependence of our time."

Read the entire piece here. Trust me you won't be disappointed.

Islamophobia

A few months back, one of my readers, Baangal, introduced me to Chaser's War on Everything, an Australian TV-show in the mould of political satire shows like the Daily Show and Colbert Report. Unfortunately the link died out, so I wasn't sure which one s/he wanted me to watch. Searching for it on YouTube produced the following video as a first hit. I found it fascinating and funny at the same time (thanks Baangal!):



I am loathe to argue that racism is the prime motivation behind American/Western foreign policy, although it does play some small role no doubt in threat-perception. And though Australia might not be the best example to draw from (Australian readers, please correct me if I'm wrong), I'd venture to say that domestic security policies tend to be motivated by considerations of race to a large extent, as displayed in that video. I can't even begin to get into what African-Americans and other minorities in America go through at the hands of the police even after the Civil Rights Movement, with great variations from place to place of course. So, I'll just stick to American responses during two security threats to the "Homeland" (note the capital "H", omitting which gets you lynched in Mississippi.)

Islamists such as AQ try to portray American actions in light of a Crusaders' (and Zionists too, oh my! Let us not forget the utterly incongruous juxtaposition of two movements 900 years apart!) anti-Muslim spirit/Islamophobia. This is obviously to miss the point - something that Islamists are very good at - that Islamophobia ties in with more general American attitudes towards the "Other". Neither is this to say that America has NEVER done anything good for people it has perceived as the Other, as the American FAR-left tend to think.

Consider the domestic response to Pearl Harbour. After which the American government responded with the internment of all ethnic Japanese, an astonishing 62% of whom were American citizens (for Trekkies out there, a young George Takei aka Sulu was one of them)!

Following 9/11, one may say that the reaction was almost restrained compared to the above, although accusations of racial profiling in airports were made. (Though not a frequent traveller, as a Muslim living in the West I can say that I've personally never felt it.)

It didn't take Americans themselves long to make the connection between the two. The increasingly-odious, intellectually dishonest and Islamophobic Michelle Malkin wrote a book defending the Japanese internment, with an obvious eye on Arab/Muslim Americans. Please don't read the book, it's not worth your time and effort. As two people far better informed about the dynamics behind the Japanese internment can tell you, it is utterly worthless and they can also recommend some alternative readings if you're suitably interested. And as they can also tell you, that Italian-Americans and German-Americans were not similarly incarcerated despite the Nazi-Fascist threat on the East Coast.

To put all the blame on the U.S. government is over-simplistic if fashionable. The rise of Islamophobia has been facilitated by a lot of things, not least the Western media depiction of Islam/Muslims. And here I fully recognise that the media's role might be a consequence rather than a first cause, but the fact remains that it can do something to make a difference. Acknowledgement of the problem might be a first step; some people are still not quite sure as to what "Islamophobia" really is or if it exists at all. (Whether the label is applicable to Rushdie or not, like the author I'm not quite sure. That man has every reason to be afraid of (some) Muslims and their leaders' irrational fatwas.)

Acknowledgement might lead to the unemployment from respectable media outlets of people who write near hate-speech such as this:

"But our media regularly make the assumption that the book burners and fanatics really do represent the majority, and that assumption has by no means been tested. (If it is ever tested, and it turns out to be true, then can we hear a bit less about how one of the world's largest religions mustn't be confused with its lunatic fringe?)"

For someone as Islamophobic as Hitchens lets himself be known in the above paragraph, denial of the very existence of Islamophobia is what keeps him alive. Given the assumption he's talking about has not been tested empirically, why would the media assume the worst about Muslims, as he does, if it were not Islamophobic? Hitchens instead of condemning this prejudice, simply assumes that empirical evidence might prove them right some day and instead rails against the critics of such media attitudes!

When the Danish cartoons (note the "the") were (self) censored in some states (both Muslim-majority and non-Muslim-majority alike), we all remembered the reaction. The defenders of free speech were crying ever louder about how Muslims were against free speech. Even criticising the cartoons' racist angle became an attack on free speech to some people! Here is Mr. Hitchens' himself at that time.

I was with the free speech advocates. I don't believe in censorship of any kind (Hello Larry Flynt!). I believe in using the voice/art/music of reason in countering hateful propaganda that shows people with turbans and beards sneaking bombs.

Now that the (not "some" - don't buy into the Western media's bullshit) Spanish cartoons have been censored too, what now folks? Where are my free speech brethren of the European/American variety? Come on folks, we have a fight on our hands.

What's worse, these cartoonists were lampooning TWO individuals, not over a MILLION of them in a few simple drawings! The hypocrisy would be tolerable if the magnitude
of it was just a tad bit saner.

While it can be argued that the idiotic response of SOME Muslims definitely deserved greater coverage of the Danish event rather the Spanish one, that still does not excuse the lack of a high-profile free speech campaign or publishers overseas publishing these cartoons simply to make the point about free speech.

Then there was the unequal coverage of two conferences on the Holocaust. This is the Wiki article for the Bali conference, in which sane Muslims and non-Muslims acknowledged the pain and suffering of Jews during the Holocaust. Note the news sources. This is the Wiki article on the Iranian one, in which the STUPIDEST Muslims and non-Muslims I can imagine got together and questioned the veracity of a historical fact. Once again, note the news sources. (My frequent reader from Tel Aviv, I don't know your religion, ethnicity or nationality, but I hope this shows you that there are Muslims who don't think that "all Jews are evil" or some such bullshit, just in case you didn't know it already.)

All this ties in with who is considered a "true" Muslim and who is not, who gets to decide and who does not, and who gets to articulate themselves as the "median" Muslim and who does not, all of which I will hopefully deal with in detail on another post. I leave you with Ayaan Hirsi Ali's astounding article in which she tries to peddle off her own experience in Saudi Arabia (of all places!) and Kenya as the quintessential Muslim experience; and a stand-up routine by the Iranian Omid Djalili that says a bit about how the Western news media gets the most fanatical Muslims to become the "median" Muslim. After all, if you're not "fanatic", you're not Muslim! Just ask Hirsi.

(skip to 6'30" if that's all you want to see, the rest is good too)

Three Burqa Stories

On the 27th of June, BBC reported that a male Bollywood singer had apologised for wearing a burqa while visiting the famous Chishti shrine in Ajmer:

Reshammiya created a stir at the shrine on Tuesday night when some devotees spotted him in a burqa. They took it up with the prayer attendants.

I wonder what these very same devotees - oh so vigilant about other people's dresses rather then their own devotions - would have made of the Imam of the Islamabad Red Mosque donning a burqa to escape the "authorities" currently besieging the mosque. Hmmmm.... the burqa as a gender-denoting garment or as the last resort of the hopelessly outnumbered and surrounded? And here I was thinking that most people wear it for "modesty". Never before has so much confusion surrounded a piece of clothing. Bikinis included.

On the Third World View, a debate about the burqa is about to start. Third World View talks about the comments made by a radio talk show host comparing burqa-wearing women to Nazis. (Yes, Nazis. I'm waiting for Jewish groups to take this fool to task for trivialising the Holocaust.) I've made my stance clear there, and before further controversy erupts I'll explain it here just a bit further. I'm neither pro/anti-burqa. I'm pro a woman's freedom to choose what she wants to wear. If women CHOOSE to wear the burqa, then Savaga, Straw and Rushdie should just suck it up and remain mum (watch this space for more rants on Rushdie). If women do NOT choose to wear the burqa or even a hijab, then all our Islamists should just suck it up and remain mum (without exploding).

Those who want women's rights to be equal to that of men's should remember one thing: a burqa is rarely the cause and mostly the consequence of discrimination against women. Remove the causes and the consequence will follow. If then, the burqa or the hijab is retained by liberated women as a sign of their identities or idiosyncrasies, then who are we to protest? Until that day, anyone (like me) who argues for a woman's right to wear a burqa will be treated as though we are speaking for the patriarchal order in the idiom of women's rights.

Remembering Shohid Jononi

26th June marks the death anniversary of one of those Bangladeshis whose love for the motherland is above question. It is a reflection of the nature of the true patriot that she had government charges against her name even as she lay dying. Those who love Bangladesh must be ever ready, ever vigilant to protect Bangladeshis, even if it means being at odds with the government of the day, whatever their political hue, whatever their political rhetoric. Jahanara Imam was one such patriot.

Unlike many, she was no hollow patriot. Not for her the nationalism that rehabilitated former collaborators. Not for her the elitism that played to well-fed, clothed urban Dhaka-ites. Not for her the Islam that overlooks the suffering of the weak and poor.

No. She gave her all. A son and a husband to the struggle for an entire people's freedom. Her pen to chronicle the forgotten pages of history. Her failing light to a cause that was as politically dangerous as it was right.

The least we can give her in return is remembrance. God bless your soul mother of martyrs!

The Politics of Silence

When the poet Shamsur Rahman died last summer, Jamaat-e-Islaami remained silent. It spoke volumes.

We are taught that it is the duty of every Muslim to mourn the death of another. Perhaps Jamaat did not approve of the Poet’s writings. Yet, instances of Muslims mourning the death of Muslims they had differed with in life are sprinkled throughout history. Perhaps, they had thought he was not a “true” Muslim. We are taught that Muslims do not pass judgment on the religiosity of other Muslims. That was for God alone. Yet, when the Poet died, Jamaat - that self-proclaimed champion of Islam and protector of Muslims - remained silent. They did not issue any public messages of condolences, did not attend the funeral for the television cameras to see and certainly did not see it fit to say, at the very least, that a Muslim of some note within the community had died.

This is not a polemic against Jamaat and it’s inherently anti-Islamic stance on issues and personalities relating to our Independence War. This is a short exploration on silence and its rather loud reverberations. The “political economy”, if you will, of what/who we choose to focus on when we create the little stories through which we grasp reality.

Consider the two Big Guns. Their myths about their respective Great Leaders are smeared with desert spaces whose size would scare even the redoubtable Robert Frost - in other words, with silence. No one talks of famine, of Shiraj “Crossfire” Shikder, of misallocation of precious little resources, of “from today you’re all Bangalis” or of a “constitutional” autocracy nowadays. Similarly, no one talks of rehabilitation of anti-Bangladeshi forces in the name of nationalism, of Muslim-chauvinistic elements in a multi-religious state in the name of state-building, of farcical elections or of “making politics difficult”. No one of course, except the other side. But their silence has already compromised their credibility.

And of course, neither side really wants to talk about Suhrawardy, Fazlul Haque, Bhashani, Osmani… you get the drift. Nor have any attempts been made by their governments to gather the personal stories of freedom fighters, because heaven knows, all of them surely did not fight for “nationalism” or “Islam” or “socialism and secularism” or “for our Great Leader” or “under our Great Leader”. Some merely fought to survive, for honour and self-respect and for their communities. And don’t even get me started on the silencing of women’s voices, the very women who suffered through those nine months. Or of the children who were adopted by the same Westerners that both Islamists and Marxists alike like to condemn for their “Imperialist” ways. Men, women and children - all silenced. What’s left? Two dead leaders and a bunch of people robbing us in their names.

Or think a bit more globally. Old-style communists - the few that are left anyway - always condemn “imperialism”. Yet, they consistently overlook the history of Soviet imperialism in Eastern Europe, as manifested in Hungary and Czekoslovakia. Once again, silence. Conversely, take the more fashionable case nowadays of one Mr. George “Dubya” Bush, who has publicly called for democracy in the Muslim world but has also publicly shaken hands with Musharraf, Mubarak and the Saudi monarchs. In other words, more silence. Islamists outside Bangladesh too practice this silence. Otherwise how can you explain the lack of sympathy when Muslim regimes oppress Muslim citizens, be they in Kurds, Kazakhs, Berbers, Rohingya refugees or Balochi warriors? Of course the one I take most personally is the silence of 1971 ...

And it’s not a recent or simply political phenomenon either. Post-modernist historians such as Said, Spivak and Bhaba have continuously pointed out how history is written from the perspective of the powerful even when written by supposedly neutral scholars. Not only does the victor write history, but s/he also gives voice to the vanquished. True, that is not the silence I’m referring to, but it leads to it. With the weakening of the vanquished voice, it becomes increasingly impossible to believe that once it was South Asia that was the more prosperous society, with a net positive balance of payments and its own functioning legal system. With disbelief comes silence, perpetuated by a thousand amnesiac PhDs as “fact” and “evidence”. That is the tragedy of silence.

A Farewell to Palestine

Golda Meir once claimed, "There was no such thing as Palestinians" before 1947. One can argue that after 1947, there definitely was an identity that could be called Palestinian. Historians will one day look upon June 14th 2007 as the day that identity died.

I try to keep up with the news as best as I can. So it came as a bit of a surprise when I read news reports that Gaza and the West Bank might be splitting, with Hamas and Fatah respectively in control.

There are reasons why I don't write about the Israel-Palestine situation. First and foremost, I feel that as Muslims we are taught to be needlessly Arab-centric and the obsession with Palestine is a sign of that. Muslims suffer in a lot of other places, such as Kashmir, Kosovo, Kazakhstan, Iraq (before and after 2003), Afghanistan (before and after 2001), Sudan, Syria, Myanmar, Thailand, and even Bangladesh. Why single out Palestine as the greatest example? Secondly, as a very proud Bangali Muslim, I feel slighted that Arabs expect us to care about their conflicts when they were "less than helpful" (quotation marks denote understatement) with "our little problem" in 1971. Thirdly, it's too easy and cliche to write about the Territories without having been there. Fourth, it's not terribly relevant to Bangladesh.

None of which is to deny the severe human rights abuses that take place there, that the people of West Bank still live under a military occupation. Or to forget that along with sub-Saharan Africa, Gaza is the only place that has seen negative GDP growth since 1999, the year the second Intifada broke out.

I'm writing about Palestine today not only because I'm surprised at the news, but because I feel that the lessons of what went wrong have some relevance for Bangladesh. Besides, it's not everyday that I get to write about what might be the birth of a new country or two.

How did it come to this? Part of the blame lies with Arafat. Whatever the virtues and flaws of the Chairman were, institution-building and personal coruption were not part of them. He ran the entire Palestinian Authority like a personal fiefdom. That did not mean he stole public money: he lived in a small two-room flat probably much simpler than yours or mine, and in his spare time drank tea with honey and watched cartoons. Nor did that mean the people were unhappy: they got their water pumps, their schools, government jobs, pretty much everything they wanted. Provided they were loyal to Arafat. Note, not Fatah, Arafat's party, but Arafat himself.

After his death, the party simply expanded its service coverage to include more Fatah loyalists instead of Arafat loyalists. Not that there was much discrepancy between the two groups. At no time did it try to be representative of the entire Palestinian people. As a result, the security forces came to include Fatah loyalists only, since government jobs were the reward for continuing loyalty. And what do you expect Fatah loyalists to do except to fight for Fatah and kill off all dissent?

Now none of this means that Hamas does not operate in similar fashion. Yes, it has charities and social welfare programs, but it also has its own security forces loyal to itself and not the Palestinian people as a whole. After Hamas' victory in the January 2006 elections, it seemed only a matter of time before fighting would erupt given the fragmented nature of the Palestinian polity, especially its armed elements. It did. And finally we end up with this: the fragmented state mirroring the internal fragmentation.

Yes, this is a very simple picture. Yes, Western countries cutting off aid, the political system, the proliferation of arms all have something to do with the current situation. But this you have to admit: if Fatah had not built up a politicised Palestinian security force that would serve regime interest over state interest (when they eventually had a state... if ever!), the chances of all this violence would have been significantly reduced. If Hamas had not followed suit, the prospects of such outright violence would have diminished even further.

Instead, we hear reports of our Islamist friends Hamas, "liberating" Gaza from Fatah security personnel and then executing them. Whatever you call that - "barbarism", "animalism", "brutality" are a few words that come to mind - that is not Islam.

So farewell Palestine, and rest in peace Edward Said. One hopes for your sake that other post-colonial states avoid the tragic mistakes of your countrymen. And yes, I do have a particular state in mind.

A tiny problem with our entire Islamism vs. Secularism debate

Came across this bittersweet little gem in the New Age Xtra:

SHARIATULLAH was angry. As he slowly tended his right shoulder blade with his shaking left hand, his silent stare at the traffic police officer who had lurched at him with the stick was that of fury... Shariatullah was now adamant to know of his fault. Even a week back it was okay to turn left at the junction onto the main road. Each question he asked was followed by another blow of the police officer. As the traffic had started to get chaotic, the officer retreated, and Shariatullah sat down on the footpath a few yards from the junction keeping his rickshaw by his side. ‘I have no problem in following the rules. But this cannot be Allah’r bichar [justice of Allah]. They make up new ones every other day. Do they know what they want? When will they stop?’

It serves as an intro to Dhaka's essentially unplanned nature, but I'm not interested in that at the moment. I'd just like to point out two things, the first socio-political the second socio-literary:

1) The man's invocation of Divine Law against the abuses of Temporal Law. How would militant secularists who also want justice deal with this? (If you're only interested in the removal of religion from the public sphere even at the cost of justice, get thee behind me Hitchens!)

More specifically, how would the "militantly secular" (click on the article: it's THEIR term) gentlemen, suspicious of every bearded man and (non-bearded) madrassah, quoted in this article deal with this situation? Let me quote the freedom fighter Shahriar Kabir from the article:

"We wanted a secular democracy," he said. "Three million people were killed during the Liberation War. If we now have to accept Islam as the basis of politics to run the country, then what was wrong with Pakistan?"

Wow! I can't even begin describe the confusion of communalism, religion-based politics and religiosity inherent in that sentence.

2) Does anyone else think that the name Shariatullah is especially appropriate for someone who just invoked the rightness of the law of God? Not the first instance of magical reality that I've noticed in Dhaka. Not the first by a long way! Reminded me of Marquez's assertion as he accepted his Nobel Prize:

"I dare to think that it is this outsized reality, and not just its literary expression, that has deserved the attention of the Swedish Academy of Letters...Poets and beggars, musicians and prophets, warriors and scoundrels, all creatures of that unbridled reality, we have had to ask but little of imagination, for our crucial problem has been a lack of conventional means to render our lives believable. This, my friends, is the crux of our solitude."

In other words, not even "magic realism" can adequately capture our magical reality.

I really hope they used his real name.

Bangladesh to open an embassy in Khartoum. Asif to open an international studies program in Dhaka.

While I'm all for South-South cooperation, I can only be appalled by the decision of the Bangladeshi government to open an embassy in Khartoum, as reported here and here. I especially love how the Bangla report says that the decision has been taken, while the English says that it has only been hinted at! Great going mouthpieces!

After calling for a reform of the OIC that everyone has known for years was a useless international organization, Iftekhar Chowdhury managed to slip this in without the local press even sniffing to try smell the stench. Which only points to how much more our "local" press needs to know about the world outside of Dhaka and South Asia.

Three/four days ago, Zafar Sobhan had written of Pakistan:

"With Pakistan lurching towards ever greater strife with each passing day, closer association with it at this precise moment in time sees like an anachronistic idea."

One now hopes that someone comes out with a similar rebuttal against greater ties with Khartoum, especially under this government. The problem is not JUST its appalling human rights record in its ethnically-African southern regions and now in Darfur (and how many Imams in Bangladesh know and are ready to denounce this blatant violence against Muslims by Muslims?). The problem is that even more than Pakistan, Sudan has an extremist government ready to export out its own brand of religious violence and intolerance under the guise of "Islam". And it doesn't take much internet research to find that out.

What's really pissing me off is OUR moral equivalence. I'm all for a realist paradigm in foreign relations. But Bangladesh does not follow a realist model at all. We have cited, and still do cite, other governments' human rights records as pretexts for not maintaining diplomatic relations with them (or perhaps our diplomacy has the sole goal of keeping the OIC happy instead of us!) We did not keep ties with apartheid South Africa, even though we could have used their resources. What about the Khartoum governments' awful treatment of Darfur's people? Should we overlook it thanks to the elusive promise of their black gold?

What's worse is calling for reform of the OIC - which opposed our independence drive and ROUTINELY disregards Muslim oppression of other Muslims - and then disregarding Darfur's suffering in the same breath. Our foreign affairs staff might regard that as Machiavellian and pat themselves on the back. But they've just crossed the fine line into outright hypocrisy.

Rant - "Secular India" version

This promises to be one of many such rants. So I go into the Daily Star website and start browsing the news. After chuckling at the fact that Afsar Chowdhury's four volume history of '71 is reviewed under "Literature" with other fiction titles, I see this news item: "Bangladesh lacks real practice of secularism". Intrigued I click on it and find that the Indian Envoy has made such a statement.

The blood begins to boil, but I read on. The article does on to say:

"Indian High Commissioner Pinak Ranjan Chakravarty yesterday said democracy would be stronger in Bangladesh if it could establish a 'real secular country like India'.

"Bangladesh is a secular country but there is no real practice of secularism... as there is a religious ministry here," he said while addressing a function on the occasion of foundation laying of Chandranath Temple in Sitakunda.

The high commissioner said democracy is very strong in India as there is no division or discrepancy among the people of different faiths and values and real secularism is practised there.

He suggested that Bangladesh follow his country for practising real secularism, which would help it establish a strong democratic country removing all discrepancies among the people of different beliefs and values."

Wow! Paternalism or onanism at its best?

Where to begin on how many ways His Excellency is wrong?

"There is no discrepancy between different faiths and values" in India? Clearly you and I see different statistics from different sources.

The very presence of "a religious ministry (sic)" defeats all purposes of equality between religious groups? Then how come our "religious ministry" also deals with non-Muslim religious groups, albeit HIGHLY UNEQUALLY (you listening CTG?) India may not have a religious ministry, but it DOES have a Ministry of Minority Affairs, whose mandate makes it clear that it deals with mostly Muslims and Sikhs within India. Oh, and "secular" Turkey has this and I'm not even going to bring up Iran with whom you're getting some pretty cozy gas deals going on. Say, would giving you our gas shut you up?

Lastly, follow the INDIAN example? You mean substitute persecution of Hindus, Buddhists and Aadibashis for persecution of Sikhs, Muslims and the whole of North-East India? Tweedledum or Tweedledee Your Excellency? I'd be laughing if this wasn't so serious!

Oh, and you might want to see the latest from India (GRAPHIC PHOTOGRAPH OF INJURIES!)

Two questions:

1) How are temples funded? I imagine they are under-funded by the GoB, which is mostly Muslim, and having been raised Muslim I know how petty and small-minded Muslims can be! I know I have a few Bangladeshi Hindu friends and readers online, so if you fill me in I'd really appreciate it. And does anyone, Hindu/Muslim/Buddhist/Christian/Jewish/whatever, have any thoughts on how to increase this funding locally instead of getting these condescending bastards to do it?

2) This is directed primarily to the Envoy. If India is so secular, why not fund a church or a buddhist temple or two? Give us a fucking break from the big talk alright? It might go down well with my countrymen less interested in your affairs, but a lot of us know what goes on inside India. Also, "the Indian envoy said Bangladesh government could expand it as a potential tourism centre"? Turning other people's sacred sites into tourist spots from the top is something that I'm firmly opposed to. May I suggest you join me in my opposition your Excellency, instead of turning my Hindu brothers ever more into a "minority" and a spectacle unto others?

Jackass!