‘Epār, Opār, Pārāpār’: The Epitasis of Baṅga Hindus

            ‘Kāṅtā Gāye Nuner Chetā’, meaning ‘rubbing salt on the wound’, may be a clichéd Bāṅglā adage, but it suits the occasion best when it comes to the task of reporting the atrocities on the Hindus by the Western media houses. Take for instance how the American news(?) daily the New York Times reported the recent attacks on the Hindus in Bangladesh. Since Sheikh Hasina, the Prime Minister of Bangladesh, has been ousted by the people of Bangladesh, news started flooding of Hindu houses being torched, Hindu temples being desecrated, and the Hindu businesses being vandalized for absolutely no reason at all. Who were doing all these? A group of mobs and thugs who camouflaged as students under the possible instigation of the Jāmāt-e-Islāmī, an extremist group of Islamist fanatics. But, for the New York Times, these were some sort of ‘revenge attacks’.

[Figure 1: The previous outlook of the article. Courtesy: Anshul Saxena.]

Facing the immense backlash on social media platforms, the word ‘revenge’ was dropped from the title while article remaining unchanged. The authors who wrote the article are: Saif Sasnat, who apparently reported from ground zero, and Qasim Nauman, the one who possibly penned the piece down. Now, the New York Times is not so new to such notoriety. That is what it gets paid for, after all. But the religious identity of both the authors may have to play with the content they produced. It is worthy to note how the authors justify the attacks: “Hindus in Bangladesh, perceived by many to be supporters of the prime minister who was ousted in a popular uprising, braced for violent reprisals on Wednesday as the rudderless country awaited the formation of a new government after a month of unrest”[1]. So, the question arises if supporting a political party which has been democratically elected to power merits to be called a crime and, if so, whether the crime merits punishments like the persecution and plunder that we have witnessed. Even if one blindly believes the conviction of the US, the self-proclaimed and self-appointed guardian of global democracy, which labels Sheikh Hasina as a dictator owing to some alleged election frauds and mismanagements, where is the introspection from the US regarding their 2020 election results which led to the riots at the Capitol? Just on a separate note, a recent survey by the Pew Research Centre suggests that over 72% American citizens have their faith in democracy shaken, if not disheveled[2].

            Coming back to where we left, we are faced with the question as to why the Western media prefers to negate or deny the atrocities which are being perpetrated against the Hindus. The Bangladesh catastrophe is not the only case. The Western media had taken a similar stance during the exodus and genocide of the Kashmiri Hindus in the 1990s. But, then again, why? Vivek Agnihotri, the filmmaker who electrified the Indian cinema with his trailblazing The Kashmir Files, has talked about the ‘conspiracy of silence’ at length on multiple platforms. But let us delve deeper into the issue. According to Dr. Gregory Stanton, a former professor of Genocide Studies at George Mason University and the founder of the Genocide Watch, there are ten stages of genocide: (a) classification, (b) symbolization, (c) discrimination, (d) dehumanization, (e) organization, (f) polarization, (g) preparation, (h) persecution, (i) extermination, and (j) denial[3]. All these stages can be traced in the ever-dilapidating condition of the Hindus in Bangladesh. Apart from classifications based on religious beliefs and the subject of idolatry, outward classifications were also made. For instance, the classification of the Hindu men is made by the distinction of beardless moustache as opposed to the moustacheless beard kept by the Muslim men, along with the tāqiyāḥ cap. It, de facto, went to the extreme by examining the men’s genitalia whether the penile hood is artificially circumcised (a part of rituals for Muslims).

[Figure 2: A Pakistani soldier checking whether the man’s penis is circumcised or not, to identify Hindus from Muslims, in 1971, in East Pakistan (now Bangladesh).]

For women, discernments were based on their attires and ornaments. Hindu women traditionally wear colourful śārī, bindi and sindūra on the forehead, and the maṅgalasūtra on the neck in contrast to the black burkhā and hijāb worn by Muslim women. These external paraphernalia act as significant markers at public places. For instance, the rates for groceries often go high at markets when the customers are Hindu and the sellers tend to discourage bargaining in toto. Thus, classification is deeply rooted in the day-to-day activities in Bangladesh. The symbolization of the Hindus has also been observed. For example, the main doorways of the Hindu houses are often found to be marked with words like ‘kāfir’ (meaning ‘infidel’, the term generally applies to a non-Muslim) or ‘dhimmi’ (a non-Muslim living in an Islamic country under protection), especially after cultural furore or political churn. Discrimination against the religious minorities, especially Hindus who comprise of the majority in the minority strata by being an approximately 8% (170 million) of the entire population, can be observed from three fronts: societal, policy-wise, and political. The societal discrimination plays in the form of not renting flats or property to the Hindus, compelling Hindus to eat at non-vegetarian restaurants where beef is served on the same table, and not allowing Hindu businesses to proliferate. The policy-wise discrimination has very well been documented by the Minority Rights Group, an international organization trusted by various government bodies and the United Nations:

The most explicit and officially tolerated means of depriving Hindus of their lands and properties has been the use of the Vested Property Act. The roots of the Vested Property Act can be traced to the Enemy Property Ordinance of 1965, promulgated as a consequence of the seventeen-day war between India and Pakistan. Companies, lands and buildings of Indian nationals and those residing in India fell under the control and management of the Pakistan government. Although they were to be returned to their rightful owners after the war ended, the state of war was never officially lifted right up to the time of Bangladesh’s independence in 1971, and India, at least for the time being, was not the enemy. However, instead of abrogating the Enemy Act, the newly formed Bangladesh government reinforced its provisions with the Vested and Non-Resident Property (Administration) Act of 1974. In April 2001, the Awami League passed the Vested Property Return Bill (2001) according to the provisions of the new law, land seized under the Vested Property Act was to be returned to the original owners or their heirs. The government was obliged to announce the returnable property within the stipulated time period of 180 days. However, in November 2002, the BNP government amended the Vested Property Law, allowing the government an unlimited right to return the properties to their rightful owners. This has meant that not only the process of returning properties taken from Hindus has failed to materialise, but further confiscations have also been conducted under the existing Vested Property Act.[4]

Moreover, the status of the identity and the rights of the religious minorities have remained very precarious ab initio, let alone be ensuring their safety. In an article published by The Sunday Guardian, Dr. Vivek Gumaste has very well depicted the dangling condition of ‘secularism’ in Bangladesh:

Sheikh Mujibur Rehman did include secularism as one of the four core governing principles in the first Constitution of Bangladesh in 1972. However, this was short-lived. In 1975, a military coup deposed Sheikh Mujibur Rehman in the name of the “Islamic Republic of Bangladesh”. Subsequently, General Ziaur Rahman further fortified the religious basis of the Constitution by deleting “secularism” as one of the four major fundamental principles of state policy and adding an Islamic invocation above the preamble (5th Amendment, 1979). Next, General Ershad deemed Islam as the state religion by introducing Article 2A, which averred that “the state religion of the Republic is Islam but other religions may be practiced in peace and harmony in the Republic” (8th Amendment, 1988). In 2011, Sheikh Hasina restored “secularism” to the Constitution, but maintained Islam as the state religion and made no changes to the preamble, retaining its religious invocation (15th Amendment). With an officially sanctioned state religion, secularism is reduced to naught sans any practical impact—the Hindus and other minorities continue to be for all intents and purposes second class citizens.[5]

Political discrimination is another significant factor. Two major political parties in Bangladesh, namely the Bangladesh National Party (BNP) and the Jāmāt-e-Islāmī (which was constitutionally deregistered to contest in elections as a valid political party in 2013 and was subsequently banned in 2024 for terrorist activities), are known for their advertent anti-Hindu and anti-India provocations, urging Bangladeshi Hindu citizens to either convert or to go back to ‘Hindustan’ (a byname for Bhārata/India). These two political groups statute the chief proponents of dehumanizing the Hindus. They have had immense hold on the mādrāsās (religious schools in Islām) since the very inception of the country’s existence. The mullāḥs (Islamic priests) are predominant among the teachers or governing bodies in these schools and they spew the venom of communal hatred since the very beginning of childhood through systematic inculcation of the Qur’ān and the Hādith, along with the dogmatic indoctrination in the śarīāḥ— the Islamic code of conduct which dehumanizes any non-Muslim, any religious non-believer, women in general, and the disabled people outrightly. Thus, the anti-Hindu or anti-minority sentiments eventually lead to the formal uprising of the genocidal tendencies. The small groups slowly gather under one roof to form the organizational structures to eradicate the minorities. This process has been observed several times by the independent media houses in Bangladesh and India, but the majority of the Western media houses often dodge these data for their vested interest. Availing this vantage, the Islamist fanatics keep polarizing the ordinary Muslims, including the varsity-educated ones who are otherwise harmonious and tend to have a humanitarian side. This fuels the preparation for the ‘jihād’ (religious war against non-Muslims) and, as a result, persecutions like the recent mob-lynching of Hindus, along with rapes, molestations, and abductions of Hindu women (including minors and infants) are very rampant in Bangladesh. Take for instance, the present scenario where the mobs, who masqueraded as student protesters and hijacked the entire spectrum, have successfully orchestrated multiple atrocities against the religious minorities in Bangladesh. The case-study by the Global Human Rights Defense (GHRD) published in 2024 has very systematically recorded the statistics of these horrific incidents[6]. Perhaps, that is why, Nupur J Sharma, the Editor-in-Chief at OpIndia, has very passionately ventilated the cries of the Hindus in Bangladesh post-Hasina chaos:

Through the past 4 days, the Bangladeshi Hindus have not particularly asked for much. All they have really asked is to be saved. Saved from the barbarians. Saved from the animals. From the savages who are committing their genocide and destroying their temples. While they get massacred, they are trying to survive and shield their faith from the mobs.[7]

The constant and intermittent persecution of Hindus in Bangladesh is slowly leading towards their utter extermination through the ongoing ethnic cleansing. There have been several statistical data and case studies which predict the alarming level of decline of the Hindus in the number of population, as well as in the population ratio. Dr. Abul Barakat, a professor at Dhaka University and a renowned economist, had made a very shocking claim in his well-researched book titled The Political Economy of Reforming Agriculture: Land Water Bodies in Bangladesh (2016) that there will be no Hindus left in Bangladesh after 30 years and “the rate of the exodus over the past 49 years points to that direction”[8]. According to Dr. Barakat, around 11.3 million Hindus left Bangladesh due to religious persecution and staggering discrimination from 1964 to 2013. If calculated on a daily estimate, around 632 Hindus fled from the land every day. The senior professor also states that these exoduses took place more during the military governance in Bangladesh in the post-Liberation War period from 1971-1991. The numbers increased during the period of 1991-2001, as per the national census. Thus further, it can be observed that the predicament of the Bangladeshi Hindus consists of nine stages of genocide. Now, let us discuss the tenth stage, that is the denial, which is the subject of the media. That the majority of the international media houses (print, television, and digital) neglect, misreport, or deny the entire discourse surrounding the genocide of Hindus is no secret to an intelligent and unbiased observer of global politics.

            Before we discuss the reasons behind their pernicious motifs, let us first understand the modus operandi with which these media houses perpetrate their nefarious propaganda. For our convenience, let us take the Al Jazeera, a Qatar-based international media outlet which is often cited or cross-referenced by the leftist ecosystem in India. Even after thousands of attacks on Hindu people, temples, and shops which were reported by various Bangladeshi and Indian news platforms as well as posted first-hand by the tormented individuals on their social media handles, the Al Jazeera fails to report or write a single article on these brutalities. However, observing the immense buzz on the internet over the concerns for the safety of the Hindus, the Al Jazeera immediately turns on its damage-control mode. On 7^th of August, 2024, it published an article titled “Students, other Muslims protect temples, churches amid Bangladesh unrest” in an attempt to deny all the heinous crimes and whitewash the Islamist mobs.

[Figure 3: Al Jazeera (7^th August, 2024)]

The very next day, it dropped in another article, calling the safety-concerns of the Hindus as ‘Islamophobic’. In other words, Islamist fanatics may kill the Hindus but if they are pointed out to their own (mis)deeds, one would be accused of ‘Islamophobia’. Classic Al Jazeera logic!

[Figure 4: Al Jazeera (8^th August, 2024)]

Afterwards, it tried to dismiss the reports on the attacks altogether. However, it makes a travesty of itself when on 11^th of August, 2024, it published the article titled “New Bangladesh government says working to ‘resolve’ attacks on minorities”.

[Figure 5: Al Jazeera (9^th August, 2024)]

So, according to the Al Jazeera, there were no attacks on the Hindus and all the Indian media houses were busy peddling fake news and fake claims to sensitize the issues to defame the Muslims and, that is why, the new Bangladeshi government issues statements regarding ‘resolving’ attacks on the minorities.