A father and a daughter, and the political volatility of Bangladesh

Call it windfall or no matter, veteran journalist, editor, creator Manash Ghosh’s fortuitous introduction to politics was to go a great distance in serving to him perceive the crests and troughs of political leaders and ideologies in Bangladesh, India’s japanese neighbour. As a cub reporter, he had gone to cowl the Second Asian Highway Car Rally organised by a UN physique, from Tehran to Dhaka. Instead, he ended up speaking to some locals.

Years later, he wrote in his e-book, Bangladesh War: Report from Ground Zero, “I obtained speaking to 3 Bengali strangers. Great talkers, as most Bengalis are, they chronicled for me the occasions on their very own — from Field Marshal Ayub Khan’s downfall to General Yahya Khan’s rise to energy, and Sheikh Mujib’s six-point autonomy motion….I requested them level clean whether or not they have been from Sheikh Mujib’s Awami League. Their rapid riposte was, ‘Every Bengali right now, whether or not Muslim, Hindu or Buddhist, in East Pakistan, is a dedicated follower of Sheikh Mujib and his Awami League.” That was in November 1970, barely months earlier than the Liberation War.

The price of conceitedness

But why did the Liberation War happen? Among many causes, was the supposed conceitedness of West Pakistan’s army and civil management. As expressed by Muntassir Mamoon who went to Pakistan some 25 years in the past for his e-book The Vanquished Generals and the Liberation War of Bangladesh, “The normal assumption was that the folks in East Pakistan, as a result of they have been Bengalis, have been pro-Hindu. Rao Farman Ali, the individual liable for the homicide of the intellectuals in 1971, stated that The Hindus have been influencing the East Pakistanis. Major General Umar, who was the Secretary of the Security Council of Pakistan in 1971, expressed the identical opinion. By pro-Hindu, they really meant pro-India.” Incidentally, Mamoon was requested, “After the creation of Pakistan, why did Jinnah first go to Karachi as an alternative of Dhaka? He ought to have first gone to Dhaka as a result of 56 per cent of the inhabitants of Pakistan have been within the East.” Probably, there lay the germ of the battle.

Cut to August 2024 when Sheikh Mujib’s elder daughter Sheikh Hasina was ousted from energy and banished from the nation. Hasina’s ouster was somewhat underneath 50 years after Mujib, as soon as stated to have had the assist of each Bangladeshi, was killed on August 15, 1975. Ghosh, broadly revered as an knowledgeable on Bangladesh politics, clears the cobwebs in his new e-book. As he writes within the epilogue of Blunders: The Power and the Plot Behind his Killing, “There are hanging similarities between what occurred previous 15 August 1975 — when Sheikh Mujibur Rahman together with 18 of his relations was killed — and that which occurred nearly 50 years in a while 5 August 2024 once more in Dhaka when Mujib’s elder daughter Sheikh Hasina was ousted from energy in a cold coup. While within the case of Mujib, the CIA station chief in Dacca was the precise actor, in his daughter’s case, there have been two actors — Peter Haas, the U.S. envoy in Dhaka, and an American Assistant Secretary of State Donald Lu — who had already earned great notoriety of being a previous grasp in covert regime change operations having toppled, within the latest previous, governments in Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Nepal.”

Power video games

It would possibly seem shocking to a layman who purchased into the claims of a scholar revolution within the nation, however in Ghosh’s view within the e-book, it was removed from it. He writes, “Hasina was anathema to Dhaka-based American diplomats who didn’t forgive her for rejecting out of hand their authorities’s request at hand over the offshore St. Martin’s island within the Bay of Bengal on an extended lease to the Americans. The latter needed to construct a U.S. naval base for maintaining a tally of Chinese and Indian naval build-up within the area. Washington needed to have a regime led by somebody who can be beholden to it and loved its full belief and confidence.”

It’s fairly doable that college students and the folks of Bangladesh didn’t perceive the politics behind Hasina’s removing. But what of Mujib’s blunders after he had all the things going for him? The image is cleared by Pinak Ranjan Chakravarty, former Indian High Commissioner to Bangladesh, who writes within the foreword of Ghosh’s e-book, “Mujib didn’t punish the collaborators of Pakistan out of compassion…Mujib didn’t foresee that these pro-Pakistan parts would take full benefit of his magnanimity and impede his insurance policies for the advantage of Pakistan. One such instance was the 1972 India-Bangladesh Treaty of Peace, Friendship and Cooperation. The treaty was attacked…for being an instrument of India’s hegemonistic design…China and Pakistan conveyed their disapproval to Bangladesh…China had not recognised Bangladesh and this was used as an excuse to decry the treaty.” Incidentally, China recognised Bangladesh solely after Mujib’s assassination throughout the dictatorship of Gen Ziaur Rehman who was recognized for his anti-India stance. During the decade-long rule of Major Zia’s widow, Begum Khaleda Zia, the Liberation War was dubbed an ‘India-inspired controversy which robbed Muslim Bengalis of their spiritual rights and id’.

Tragic twist

Indeed, Mujib was too trusting of these unfit of his belief. He paid the last word value. His nation suffered too. Recalls Ghosh in his thoughtfully written e-book, “Mujib, or Bangabandhu, as he was popularly recognized, even after witnessing acts of betrayal by his supposed ‘very shut’ confidants, like Mushtaq and Taheruddin Thakur…had sought to disregard the clear warning indicators. He had been warned by Tajuddin to not be blind to the misdeeds of the venous snakes within the grass that abounded within the occasion.” Interestingly, in a uncommon departure from the highlight on Mujib, Ghosh seeks to offer Tajuddin (prime minister in exile in India) credit score for a lot of the early success, writing, “Bangladesh would by no means have been liberated had Tajuddin not been the prime minister of the interim authorities. His distinctive management functionality to convey folks of various political hues, professions and spiritual faiths underneath the liberation battle fold stays unparalleled.”

In reality, Tajuddin went again to Dhaka solely after getting the Bangladesh forex notes printed in Nashik Press.

It didn’t show a sensible determination for him then.

From 1971 to 2025, Bangladesh has skilled political volatility. Warns Ghosh, “Political turbulence will collect steam and instability will proceed to hang-out this japanese neighbour of India. Hasina’s Awami League is not any pushover and much from a vanquished power.”