Source/Credit: ViewPoint Online | Cross-post
By Riaz ul Hassan | November 30, 2011
In 2001, Jamaat contested the election as a BNP-ally while its Ameer and general secretary became Khalida Zia’s cabinet ministers. At country’s 30th birthday Jamaat was ruling, at least partly, the country it had bitterly resisted at the time of its birth. It did not matter that the government was headed by a woman
The Bangladesh War of Liberation was fought, in a way, against the political abuse of Islam by the Punjabi/Mohajir establishment. In this War of Liberation, like all the other Islamist outfits, Jamaat-i-Islami was on the other side of the fence.
The attitude of the Jamaat Islami to the problems and issues raised by the East Pakistanis even prior to the military action was hostile at worst, ambiguous at best. Hence, Jamaat was never able to make any progress in East Pakistan. At the time of Partition, Jamaat had only one member in East Pakistan. At the time of Bangladesh’s liberation, it had 425 members (and roughly 2100 in West Pakistan).
Soon after the creation of Pakistan, the first expression of East Pakistan’s displeasure manifested in the form of language riots. Jinnah wanted Urdu as the state language. East Pakistan wanted both Urdu and Bengali as state languages. Jinnah rejected East Pakistan’s plea. From February 1948 onwards, the language issue began to dominate politics in East Pakistan.
In March 1948, there were student strikes and demonstrations throughout the province. The Centre finally capitulated to East Pakistan’s demand in 1952 but several language activists were killed during the movement. The Jamaat reaction to the acceptance of Bengali as an official language was unwelcoming if not hostile. The Jamaat organ Tarjuman al-Quran, for instance, declared that accepting Bengali would discourage East Pakistanis from learning Urdu, hence, keeping them ignorant of Islam since Bengali lacked Islamic literature.
Though Jamaat later on began to pay lip service to East Pakistani concerns like the language issue or their under-representation in the military, the real problems for them were East Pakistan’s “Hindus, who dominated trade, and the communists who exploited the situation”. While enumerating remedial measures, Maulana Mawdudi, for instance, urged the Ulema to rid the East Pakistani masses of their ignorance of Islam, because “the influence of Hindu culture over their language, dress, habits and way of thinking was so exceedingly great that they have lost all sense of its being an extraneous element in their life.” The problem, so to speak, was not exploitation at the hands of West Pakistan but East Pakistan’s lack of Islamisation.
The Jamaat contended that Bengali literature was pervaded by Hindu ideas since Tagore was the major influence, while similes and proverbs reflected Hindu thought and social ways of life. Even scarier: Bengali literature failed to reflect Islamic politics, economics and lifestyles.
When Shaikh Mujeeb presented his Six Points, Jamaat fervently rejected them on the pretext that the Six Points would imply secession. When the military operation in March 1971 was launched, Jamaat intensified its campaign against the Awami League. Jamaat declared the Awami League and India tools of a world Christian-Jewish conspiracy --- involving the USA, USSR and UK, since Jews determined the foreign policies of these countries --- to dismember Pakistan.
The feverish Jamaat propaganda may sound hysterical in retrospect. However, at the time it helped rationalise the crimes committed against East Pakistanis. Not content with ideological justifications, Jamaat raised militias and actively participated, alongside the Pakistan Army, in liquidating radical and progressive intellectuals and activists. Rahmat Ilahi, Jamaat’s general secretary, declared in May 1973, while East Pakistan was being brutalised: ‘Our brave army has saved Pakistan’. Maulana Mawdudi also appealed to ‘genuine Muslims to help the army in rounding up the Awami Leaguers’. He urged East Pakistanis to support the Pakistan Army in foiling the freedom movement sponsored by Hindus, communists, and atheist Bengali nationalists, all of whom were agents of India, imperialism and the Jews.
In April 1971, Maulana sent a memorandum to 39 Muslim heads of states, as well as Rabita Alam Islami, justifying the military action in East Pakistan. In his memorandum, he claimed that the Awami League movement was launched under the influence of Hindu professors and Hindu Bengali literature.
In July, a Jamaat delegation, headed by K J Murad, was dispatched to Europe and West Asia. The delegation visited the UK, Turkey, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia and some other countries to counteract pro-Bangladesh propaganda. Similarly, Jamaat delegations were dispatched from West Pakistan to East Pakistan. The Jamaat general secretary, alongside General (retd) Umrao Khan, visited East Pakistan in May 1971. Similarly, in June 1971, Acting Amir Mian Tufail visited East Pakistan. On his return, Mian Tufail urged the army to re-conquer every inch lost to the enemy. He said that there should be no delay in killing all those responsible for the armed revolt. He blamed all elected Awami League MPs for the chaos. He thought by-elections in a few constituencies, announced by the Yahya regime, would not suffice. He instead demanded the assembly be dissolved and fresh elections held.
The Jamaat had fared badly in the elections held a few months before. It managed only four seats from West Pakistan and none from East Pakistan. However, in the farcical by-elections --- the Awami League was banned and hence could not contest them --- Jamaat fielded 19 candidates and bagged five (probably uncontested) National Assembly seats. During the War of Liberation, Jamaat was part and parcel of the ‘civilian government’, a farcical facade the army had erected in East Pakistan.
Understandably, when the country’s constitution was framed, secularism --- along with democracy, nationalism and socialism --- became one of the four State Principles, while faith-based parties were proscribed under Article 38.
In the immediate post-liberation period Jamaat went underground. Tableeghi Jamaat proved an effective cover. Abdul Khaleque as Acting Ameer steered the clandestine Jamaat ship during this period.
On August 15, 1975 the country’s founding father Sheikh Mujeeb, along with a handful of political associates and most of his family members, was killed in a right-wing military coup. The coup makers installed Khandaker Mushtaq Ahmed as president. Mujeeb’s conservative cabinet colleague, Khandaker tried to recast country’s image as more Muslim, anti-India and pro-western.
But before the Khandaker regime was able to stablise itself, officers and soldiers with socialist leanings, led by Brigadier Khaled, removed the Khandaker regime. Known as the Sepoy Revolution, this coup was defeated by a counter-coup. At the end of a three-month-long political struggle rife with coups, General Zia ur Rehman emerged as a military strongman.
The Zia-regime promulgated the Political Parties Regulation in August 1976 and repealed Article 38. Thus the space offered by Zia regime helped Jamaat revive. Jamaat in alliance with Nizam-e-Islami built the Islamic Democratic League (IDL). In 1979, it re-emerged with its own identity.
When the second parliamentary (Sangsad) elections were held in 1979, the IDL-Muslim League alliance won 20 seats. Six of Jamaat’s members were elected. A year before, Jamaat’s pre-independence chief, Maulana Azam, had returned to Bangladesh as a Pakistani citizen.
On May 30, 1981 General Zia was killed in yet another abortive military coup led by Major General Abdul Manzoor. His death led to presidential elections won by General Zia’s Bangladesh National Party (BNP). On March 24, 1982 Lt. General Hussain Muhammad Ershad staged yet another coup. The BNP government of President Abdus Sattar was overthrown. Ershad ruled until 1990.
Jamaat meantime (1982-83) was afflicted by internal strife and factional fights. The bone of contention, among other factors, was Jamaat’s attitude towards the Iranian revolution. The faction inspired by Khomeni split to form the Islami Jubo Shibir.
In 1986, Jamaat contested the third Sangsad elections and managed to secure ten seats. However, it boycotted the elections for the fourth Sangsad. More importantly, it joined hands with the opposition alliance against Gen. Ershad and gained much needed credibility.
In the post-Ershad period, Jamaat did even better on the electoral front when the fifth Sangsad elections were held on February 27, 1991: 18 seats (12% of votes).
In 1992, Jamaat miscalculated and badly stumbled when it nominated Ghulam Azam as its Ameer. Azam, technically a citizen of Pakistan at the time, signified Jamaat’s anti-liberation role. His nomination created a groundswell of anti-Jamaat passion. The secularists formed the Committee for the Elimination of the Killers and Collaborators. Azam and Jamaat became a target of a campaign aimed at trying the war criminals.
Jamaat, at this stage, allied with the Awami League in the anti-BNP government agitation. It boycotted the sixth Sangsad elections in February 1996 but contested the seventh Sangsad elections. It gained only three seats and 8.6% of the votes. Jamaat’s best time was yet to come!
In 2001, it contested the election as a BNP-ally, won 17 seats (4.2% of votes) while its Ameer, Motiur Rehman Nizami, and general secretary, Ali Ahsan Mojahed, became Khalida Zia’s cabinet ministers. At its 30th birthday Jamaat was ruling, at least partly, the country it had bitterly resisted at the time of its birth. It did not matter that the government was headed by a woman.
Before East Pakistan plunged into the War of Liberation, Jamaat had 425 members and 40,000 sympathisers (in 1969). By 2003, Jamaat had recruited 14,700 members and four million sympathizers.
Meantime, the liberal and secular forces kept campaigning for trying war criminals. In the last general elections, war crimes during the War of Liberation became an election issue. Jamaat paid dearly. The Awami League bagged 263 out of 300 seats. Jamaat was trounced. The Bangladesh story has many lessons for Pakistan!
But what explains Jamaat’s recovery after its near-total annihilation in 1971-72?
Like Pakistan, like Bangladesh! At least when it comes to Jamaat-i-Islami. It was Allah, represented by Saudi petro-dollars, America and the country’s adventurous army that helped revive Jamaat's fortunes. Saudi Arabia recognized Bangladesh soon after Mujib’s assassination. However, in the face of growing unpopularity and as a buffer against Maoist opposition, Shaikh Mujeeb himself resorted to religion, thus offering much needed space to Islamists.
As a goodwill gesture, Mujib's government increased the budgetry allocation for madrassas from Taka 2,500,000 anually to Taka 7,200,000. In his bid to cultivate relations with oil-rich Sultans, Shaikh Mujib began to invoke the country’s Islamic credentials. To placate the Sultans, he attended the Islamic Summit in Lahore (1974). While Bangladesh received $78.9 from Muslim/OPEC countries between 1971-75, aid money increased to $474 between 1976-81. This aid boosted Islamists' leverage in the country’s politics.
(Farooq Sulehria also contributed to this essay).
Read original post here: Jamaat in Bangladesh
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