War Crimes Trial- Unification or Division of Nation?
--Ziauddin Choudhury
There is a serious need for soul searching now in the country. This is not to say that we have all lost our soul and we need to find it somewhere. The search is for who we are, and where we are headed. This is not just about politics, not about who will be our next ruler, or how our economy will shape. This is about our net worth as a nation, our beliefs, and the principles that would guide our next generation. This is about our identity, nationhood, and heritage and history.
Divisive politics that has been ruling our country for last two decades has shown its ugly side many times, mostly in the form of violence and break down of law and order. However, this division has been mostly for grabbing power and control. Now this division has to come to fore in light of the ongoing war crimes trial and the succession of protests and counter protests following sentencing in a number of trials. In one hand there have been protests by people calling themselves as pro liberation forces where the sentences have been denounced as too weak. On the other hand the sentences have been rejected as unjust and politically motivated.
The division would not have been so pronounced if these protests and counter protests been limited to simply the trial venue and vicinity, but the protests on both sides spread country wide early this year focusing on issues that some of us thought should have been settled long before following our independence. A more prominently display of this division came through two recent events, death of Professor Ghulam Azam of Jamat-e-Islam, and Professor Pias Karim, an academic and a political commentator who professed a different line of politics. The disputes about how they should be treated after death led to unfurling of emotions by both their critics and supporters showing an ideological divide which resurfaced issues affecting our identity as a Bengali nation, and the values for which the war of independence was fought.
It is possible to have a country or a society that has views on opposite ends of the spectrum, be it politics or societal norms. Liberals and progressive want a country or a society that adheres to changes and adapt to these changes; the conservatives tend more to avoid changes and cling to traditions. In democracies each group floats their ideas and tries to win others to their way of thinking through platforms of their choice, but with some basic agreement on nationhood, identity and national heritage. In mature nations the fundamentals of nationhood or national identity are not called into question, nor there is a debate on its history and heritage. Unfortunately these are the issues at stake for us some forty plus years after independence, which have surfaced ironically along with the trials of war criminals. And these issues do not seem to represent polarization of country on political views, but division of the country across two different ideas of nationhood and political history.
A key factor why we still have a debate on identity and nationhood is we have failed to inculcate in our next generation and educate them properly in the genesis of the liberation war, the principles for which it was fought, and about the fighters for freedom who straddled religion, political beliefs, and ethnic background.
Much of this failure lies on our political leaders, but a good part of it also belongs to individuals and families who could not transmit to the next generation the pride of our Bengali heritage and culture, the two important reasons that we wanted to protect from attack by the people who we fought in that war. The most significant reason why we have this recurring debate, however, is narrating our history of liberation from partisan perspective, and dispensing it to the next generation from that view. A national war that was fought by most Bangladeshis came to be appropriated by one or the other political party as solely its effort, and its achievement.
In moments of social crises people forget personal enmities and rally behind one another to fight a common enemy or calamity. In times of national crisis such as war or natural calamity political adversaries relegate their differences to background and unite to fight the common danger. This had happened in our liberation war when liberals, progressives, and die hard conservatives united to confront the common danger posed by Pakistan Army. Independence of Bangladesh was a result of joint fight irrespective of party, religion, or ethnic affiliation. Independence was not the sole achievement of a single political party or a small group of people. It was the achievement of a whole people across all faith and political persuasion.
When national leaders fail, other dormant forces prop up. Our leaders were more busy claiming ownership of independence and belittling or denigrating other’s contribution than teaching people values and principles of the war of liberation. Their bickering and constant maligning of their founders helped to erase from people’s mind the real perpetrators of war atrocities. In many ways this political feud helped to rehabilitate the anti-liberation forces them, some times to spite each other.
It is a great pity that the division of the country today affects the largest segment of our population who do not carry any baggage from pre liberation days. They have no memory either of the atrocities of Pakistan and its collaborators, or of the great sacrifices of their previous generation. Their knowledge of the war and its participants on either side is derived from books that may or may not have the right accounts or from political parties they patronize. In other words what they have is not real history, but an interpretation of history with a political bias. No wonder many of this generation will be confused about their identity. Some even may want to seek a completely different one.
Politics is never about unity, it is about political power. But a nation is about unity, it is about identity and pride in nationhood. It is a cry in the wilderness in today’s politics in Bangladesh to call upon our leaders to rise above partisan interests and prevent division of the country along lines that should have disappeared after independence. The war crimes trial should not be a cause for revival of the issues that led to our independence struggle. The believers in our war of independence and its values will be a waning minority and a new identity for Bangladesh will be established if our political leaders do not heed the message now being written.
--Ziauddin Choudhury
There is a serious need for soul searching now in the country. This is not to say that we have all lost our soul and we need to find it somewhere. The search is for who we are, and where we are headed. This is not just about politics, not about who will be our next ruler, or how our economy will shape. This is about our net worth as a nation, our beliefs, and the principles that would guide our next generation. This is about our identity, nationhood, and heritage and history.
Divisive politics that has been ruling our country for last two decades has shown its ugly side many times, mostly in the form of violence and break down of law and order. However, this division has been mostly for grabbing power and control. Now this division has to come to fore in light of the ongoing war crimes trial and the succession of protests and counter protests following sentencing in a number of trials. In one hand there have been protests by people calling themselves as pro liberation forces where the sentences have been denounced as too weak. On the other hand the sentences have been rejected as unjust and politically motivated.
The division would not have been so pronounced if these protests and counter protests been limited to simply the trial venue and vicinity, but the protests on both sides spread country wide early this year focusing on issues that some of us thought should have been settled long before following our independence. A more prominently display of this division came through two recent events, death of Professor Ghulam Azam of Jamat-e-Islam, and Professor Pias Karim, an academic and a political commentator who professed a different line of politics. The disputes about how they should be treated after death led to unfurling of emotions by both their critics and supporters showing an ideological divide which resurfaced issues affecting our identity as a Bengali nation, and the values for which the war of independence was fought.
It is possible to have a country or a society that has views on opposite ends of the spectrum, be it politics or societal norms. Liberals and progressive want a country or a society that adheres to changes and adapt to these changes; the conservatives tend more to avoid changes and cling to traditions. In democracies each group floats their ideas and tries to win others to their way of thinking through platforms of their choice, but with some basic agreement on nationhood, identity and national heritage. In mature nations the fundamentals of nationhood or national identity are not called into question, nor there is a debate on its history and heritage. Unfortunately these are the issues at stake for us some forty plus years after independence, which have surfaced ironically along with the trials of war criminals. And these issues do not seem to represent polarization of country on political views, but division of the country across two different ideas of nationhood and political history.
A key factor why we still have a debate on identity and nationhood is we have failed to inculcate in our next generation and educate them properly in the genesis of the liberation war, the principles for which it was fought, and about the fighters for freedom who straddled religion, political beliefs, and ethnic background.
Much of this failure lies on our political leaders, but a good part of it also belongs to individuals and families who could not transmit to the next generation the pride of our Bengali heritage and culture, the two important reasons that we wanted to protect from attack by the people who we fought in that war. The most significant reason why we have this recurring debate, however, is narrating our history of liberation from partisan perspective, and dispensing it to the next generation from that view. A national war that was fought by most Bangladeshis came to be appropriated by one or the other political party as solely its effort, and its achievement.
In moments of social crises people forget personal enmities and rally behind one another to fight a common enemy or calamity. In times of national crisis such as war or natural calamity political adversaries relegate their differences to background and unite to fight the common danger. This had happened in our liberation war when liberals, progressives, and die hard conservatives united to confront the common danger posed by Pakistan Army. Independence of Bangladesh was a result of joint fight irrespective of party, religion, or ethnic affiliation. Independence was not the sole achievement of a single political party or a small group of people. It was the achievement of a whole people across all faith and political persuasion.
When national leaders fail, other dormant forces prop up. Our leaders were more busy claiming ownership of independence and belittling or denigrating other’s contribution than teaching people values and principles of the war of liberation. Their bickering and constant maligning of their founders helped to erase from people’s mind the real perpetrators of war atrocities. In many ways this political feud helped to rehabilitate the anti-liberation forces them, some times to spite each other.
It is a great pity that the division of the country today affects the largest segment of our population who do not carry any baggage from pre liberation days. They have no memory either of the atrocities of Pakistan and its collaborators, or of the great sacrifices of their previous generation. Their knowledge of the war and its participants on either side is derived from books that may or may not have the right accounts or from political parties they patronize. In other words what they have is not real history, but an interpretation of history with a political bias. No wonder many of this generation will be confused about their identity. Some even may want to seek a completely different one.
Politics is never about unity, it is about political power. But a nation is about unity, it is about identity and pride in nationhood. It is a cry in the wilderness in today’s politics in Bangladesh to call upon our leaders to rise above partisan interests and prevent division of the country along lines that should have disappeared after independence. The war crimes trial should not be a cause for revival of the issues that led to our independence struggle. The believers in our war of independence and its values will be a waning minority and a new identity for Bangladesh will be established if our political leaders do not heed the message now being written.