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Bangladesh: Facing Political and Ethnic Challenges Matt Fouts

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Bangladesh: Facing Political and Ethnic Challenges Matt Fouts Bangladesh: Facing Political and Ethnic Challenges Matt Fouts Bangladesh’s history is relatively short, particularly when using the term Bangladesh itself implies the country’s political history. In other words, the country is new if one considers its age from its founding legal framework and the creation of Bangladesh as a geographic entity in 1971.1 Measured in a different way, Bangladesh can be traced back over two thousand years, with the later medieval period witnessing the area’s political coalescent into a shape familiar today, inhabited primarily by Bengali speakers.2 While the older history alluded to above is not of great significance to this report, the paradoxical nuance of a new country in an old land is important when examining Bangladesh broadly as this report seeks to do. Bangladesh is truly a fascinating, if not confusing, country to examine. The last decades have witnessed independence, assassinations, political upheavals, massive suffering, impressive economic growth, and the political domination of two female leaders in a predominately Muslim country. The incredibly intense interparty and interpersonal rivalries between Sheikh Hasina and Khaleda Zia have led to each receiving jail time during the other’s tenure and continued brutality in campus dormitories as youth representatives of their respective parties enforce party allegiance.3 The parties, Hasina’s Awami League (AL) and 1 Rashid, Haroun er. Pathways to Power: The Domestic Politics of South Asia. Rowman & Littlefield, 2014, 345. 2 Rashid. Pathways to Power: The Domestic Politics of South Asia, 345. 3 “Bangladesh’s Ruling Party Runs University Campuses With an Iron Fist.” The Economist, October 31, 2019; “Khaleda Zia Freed Gets Back Home.” The Daily Star, March 26, 2020. https://www.thedailystar.net/frontpage/news/khaleda-zia-released-six-months-1885888; “Sheikh Hasina Was Arrested to Confine Democracy.” The Daily Star, July 20, 2019. https://www.thedailystar.net/city/news/sheikh- hasina-was-arrested-confine-democracy-1774087. Zia’s Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), were founded by Hasina’s father and Zia’s husband, both major figures in the 1971 founding of Bangladesh. Below, this paper will examine Bangladesh’s political challenges and evolving religious/ethnic conflicts. First, the history of Bangladesh will be examined briefly, including geography, discussions of British colonial rule, the partition of India/Pakistan in 1947, and Bangladesh’s independence from Pakistan in 1971. Next, Bangladesh’s political history will be examined through the lenses of the two major parties discussed above, as well as a brief discussion of a more minor Islamic party who plays a major coalitional role in a politically divided country. Finally, this paper will briefly touch on suggestions for solving the political challenges facing Bangladesh, realizing such challenges are intimately tied to religious and ethnic conflict. Throughout, religious and ethnic conflict will be discussed, a topic inseparable from the nation’s history and lasting political challenges. History Significant in later discussions of Bangladesh’s political history, Bangladesh means land of the Bengali, or people who speak Bengali.4 Political Bangladesh spans half of this area.5 85 million Bengali speakers live in the Indian states of West Bengal, Assam, and Tripura, compared with the 100 million speakers in Bangladesh.6 Beyond language, geographically Bangladesh is 4 Rashid. Pathways to Power: The Domestic Politics of South Asia, 345. 5 Rashid. Pathways to Power: The Domestic Politics of South Asia, 345. 6 “Bengali Language.” Encyclopedia Britannica. Accessed May 24, 2020. https://www.britannica.com/topic/Bengali-language. 2 near many other countries as it is surrounded by India, bordering Myanmar, and within close distance of Nepal and Bhutan from the northern border.7 Modern-day Bangladesh gained its independence from Pakistan in 1971 and was known formally as East Pakistan (and East Bengal immediately after the 1947 Partition).8 The Liberation War led to an unknown number of deaths, with estimates ranging from 300,000 to 3 million civilian deaths.9 Bangladesh’s later independence is tied to the early 1947 Partition and the creation of Pakistan in 1947.10 The separation of India and Pakistan In 1947 similarly followed previous British colonial practices that divided Muslims and Hindus, prioritizing each in certain regions in order to better maintain colonial control of the area.11 The creation of the All India Muslim League in 1905, in Bangladesh’s later capital Dhaka, followed Muslims leaving the Indian National Congress, as it was increasingly seen as a political entity dominated by Hindus.12 Inequality, in part, between the Hindu elites and poorer Muslims 7 Rashid. Pathways to Power: The Domestic Politics of South Asia, 347. 8 “Under Threat: The Challenges Facing Religious Minorities in Bangladesh.” Minority Rights Group International. Accessed May 12, 2020. https://minorityrights.org/wp- content/uploads/2016/11/MRG_Rep_Ban_Oct16_ONLINE.pdf. 9 “Under Threat: The Challenges Facing Religious Minorities in Bangladesh.” 10 Rashid. Pathways to Power: The Domestic Politics of South Asia, 348. 11 Rashid. Pathways to Power: The Domestic Politics of South Asia, 348-49. 12 Rashid. Pathways to Power: The Domestic Politics of South Asia, 349. 3 in Bengal, led to Muslim demands for a Muslim majority province.13 East Bengal and Assam, with Dhaka as a capital, were created in response, and later eliminated by the colonial government due to Hindu protests largely in Calcutta.14 The brief creation of a Muslim majority province, than sudden elimination, emboldened the Hindu-dominated Indian National Congress and infuriated the Muslim League.15 Later in the 1940s, as Britain’s imminent departure became more evident, Hindu and Muslim politicians in Bengal sought to create an independent state.16 This effort failed and the British supported a partition of Bengal and Assam. 17 In 1947, Pakistan was created with two entities: West Pakistan and East Bengal, later renamed East Pakistan. Soon after the 1947 creation of Pakistan, and the geographically separated entities of West Pakistan and East Bengal, the political and religious challenges of language quickly became apparent.18 Within a year, political forces in East Bengal demanded that Bengali be declared a national language alongside Urdu.19 Politician in West Pakistan resisted this request, arguing that Urdu was the proper script for Muslims in the west and east as it included more Arabic words written in the Persian script.20 The problem of language created a major cultural division between the two entities, which was exacerbated further by the inequality in economic development between the wealthier West and East.21 13 Rashid. Pathways to Power: The Domestic Politics of South Asia, 345. 14 Rashid. Pathways to Power: The Domestic Politics of South Asia, 345. 15 Rashid. Pathways to Power: The Domestic Politics of South Asia, 349. 16 Rashid. Pathways to Power: The Domestic Politics of South Asia, 350. 17 Rashid. Pathways to Power: The Domestic Politics of South Asia, 350. 18 Rashid. Pathways to Power: The Domestic Politics of South Asia, 350. 19 Rashid. Pathways to Power: The Domestic Politics of South Asia, 350. 20 Rashid. Pathways to Power: The Domestic Politics of South Asia, 350. 21 Rashid. Pathways to Power: The Domestic Politics of South Asia, 350. 4 Tensions over language and economic inequality between the two regions continued to simmer. Rising nationalism in the East coincided with a military coup in Pakistan led by General Ayub Khan.22 Khan, seemingly meeting demands from the East, accepted Bengali as an official language of Pakistan (along with Urdu) and renamed East Bengal to East Pakistan.23 Regardless of the success of the Language Movement, the divisions between West and East Pakistan continued to grow, driven by economic inequalities between the separated regions.24 Population growth remained at a high 2.7% in both regions, stressing the respective economies.25 Yet, regardless of demographic stressors, West Pakistan was experiencing a development boom during the 1950s and 1960s and the 61% difference in per-capita income between the regions allowed the West to better provide for its growing population.26 Language and economics divided the country; however, an election became the catalyst for East Pakistan’s independence. In 1969, General Ayub Khan was forced out by General Yahya Khan.27 Political pressures later forced Yahya Khan to call an election.28 Prior to the election, Yahya Khan had East Pakistan’s leading politician, Sheikh Mujibor Rahman, arrested. Sheikh Mujib, leader of East Pakistan’s Awami League political party and father of current Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, was released and subsequently won 167 out of 169 parliament 22 Rashid. Pathways to Power: The Domestic Politics of South Asia, 351. 23 Rashid. Pathways to Power: The Domestic Politics of South Asia, 351. 24 Rashid. Pathways to Power: The Domestic Politics of South Asia, 352. 25 Rashid. Pathways to Power: The Domestic Politics of South Asia, 352. 26 Rashid. Pathways to Power: The Domestic Politics of South Asia, 352. 27 Rashid. Pathways to Power: The Domestic Politics of South Asia, 352. 28 Rashid. Pathways to Power: The Domestic Politics of South Asia, 352. 5 seats in East Pakistan.29 Sheikh Mujib, a politician from East Pakistan, demanded the position of Pakistan’s Prime Minister.30 Yahya Khan resisted, and negotiations began between Sheikh Mujibor, Ali Bhutto (a West Pakistan party leader), and Khan himself.31 On March 25, 1971, Khan suddenly left the negotiations in Dhaka and a brutal military crackdown began.32 The next day, Zia Ur Rahman, prominent politician in East Pakistan and husband of later Prime Minister Khaleda Zia, proclaimed an independent state of Bangladesh.33 After nearly nine months of fighting, an astronomical number of deaths as mentioned above, and the intervention of India into the conflict, Bangladesh celebrated victory and independence on December 16th, 1971.34 Before concluding this section, it is worth noting the important differences between the 1947 and 1971 revolutions.
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