Gender, Personal Laws and Practices of the Bengali Barua Buddhists of Bangladesh

Chapter 4 Gender, Personal Laws and Practices of the Bengali Barua Buddhists of Bangladesh

Shahnaz Huda

Figure 4.1 Celebrating Vesak at the Dharmarajik Buddhist Monastery in Dhaka. Photo by Mohamad Asad/DRIK

1 Introduction

In Bangladesh, where the population is overwhelmingly Muslim, Buddhists, even though they number even less than one percent of the population, form the second largest religious minority group after the Hindus. By virtue of the Fifteenth Amendment, Article 2A of the Constitution of the People’s Repub- lic of Bangladesh was substituted and religions other than that of the major- ity (i.e. the Muslims) were named for the first time in the document which is the apex law of the country. Although Islam continues to be recognized as the ‘state religion,’ other religions are also mentioned. Article 2A reads:

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The state religion of the Republic is Islam, but the State shall ensure equal status and equal right in the practice of the Hindu, Buddhist, Christian and other religions.

Bangladeshi Buddhists follow the Theraveda School of Buddhism and may be grouped into two—the tribal or indigenous Buddhists from the hill tract areas and the Bengali Buddhists (mainly Baruas) from the plains of Chittagong. The inhabitants of the Chittagong Hill Tracts (cht) region—i.e. the indigenous community (or what is referred to after the Fifteenth Amendment, under Article 23A of the Constitution, as tribes, minor races, ethnic sects and communities’), which include the Chakma, Marma, Tanchangya and other Jumma people, are primarily and almost entirely Buddhists. The cht includes the three districts of Rangamati, Khagrachhari and Bandarban, and is ‘surrounded by the Chittagong and Cox’s Bazar plains stretching along the bay of Bengal on the West, by the Indian States of Tripura and Mizoram on the North and East and by the Arakan region of Myanmar on the South and Southeast.1 The remaining Buddhists of Bangladesh are descendants of the ancient Chittagonian Bengali Baruas. Individual Buddhists, Buddhist families and communities are not nec- essary confined to the above areas only but have a presence, however small, in other parts of Bangladesh where they have migrated, either temporarily or permanently, for a variety of purposes such as education and employment. The Baruas Buddhists are those ethnic Buddhists who are Bengali speaking and are, as mentioned previously, primarily concentrated in the plains of the Chittagong region of Bangladesh. Their uniqueness lies in the fact that whilst most Bengalis are followers of the Muslim and Hindu religions, ‘for historical reasons that are not clear, the Barua have survived as a Buddhist enclave in the midst of the two giants of Islam and Hinduism.’2 The Baruas Buddhists are said to be of ancient origin and in fact the origin of the name Chittagong, is Chaitya-Grama which means ‘town with Buddhist shrines.’3 Magh was the general term used for Buddhists and the Baruas were sometimes termed as Rajbansi, i.e. of royal descent.4 The word ‘Barua’ came from ‘Baru’ meaning great and ‘Arya’ meaning noble ones.5 Another authority explains the etymology of the name Barua as being derived from two words,

1 Human Rights Summer School & Community Law Reform (hrssclr). Tying the Knot: Community Law Reform & Confidence Building in the Chittagong Hill Tracts; Rahman, Dr. Mizanur and Shawon, Tanim Hussain (eds.); (Dhaka: hrssclr 2001) at p. 4. 2 http://joshuaproject.net/people_groups/16535/INIdentity. 3 http://www.digplanet.com/wiki/Barua_%28Bangladesh%29. 4 Ibid. 5 Ibid.