As West Bengal starts to become West Bangladesh, time to remember how Bangladesh was formed to realize the goals of Lahore Resolution

[F-6 enthusiast]

Author- Mohit Ray

The author is a well-known environmentalist, refugee rights activist and state committee member of BJP in West Bengal. He has authored a number of books on the environment and Bangladesh issues.

Hol up

 

[mb444]

One problem with West Bengal joining Bangladesh - Hindus in West Bengal hate Bangladesh. I've worked with several Indian Bengalis and expected them to have a soft corner for their brethren in the east. But to my surprise, every single one of 'em dislike Bangladesh

Its called envy..... hindu west bengalies are completely irrelevant when it comes to BD

 

[Wood]

Its called envy..... hindu west bengalies are completely irrelevant when it comes to BD

I don't know if it is envy. But they do form the majority in West Bengal, so their opinion matters if Bangladesh wants to take absorb West Bengal as some members here have said.

 

[Bilal9]

I don't know if it is envy. But they do form the majority in West Bengal, so their opinion matters if Bangladesh wants to take absorb West Bengal as some members here have said.

WB GDP per capita is half that of Bangladesh and economy is almost totally dependent on supplying goods and services to Bangladesh.

Kolkata Hospitals are very dependent on medical tourism from Bangladesh, ditto for Kolkata Malls, restaurants, boutiques and hotels, totally dependent on Bangladeshi clientele. Because of Covid and lack of Bangladeshi tourists, these folks are facing some really tough times.

A few hating us or having a negative opinion doesn't really matter - probably the ones that had to leave here because of East Pakistan being formed.

WB folks know that even if all of India turned their backs on them, we would not turn them away. Many of the more educated ones work in Bangladesh, because of low salaries in India.

It is well known that BJP does not have a political leg to stand on in WB, much less Kolkata. Hence all the screaming and jumping up/down, this article is but one evidence of this.

Majority of West Bengal folks here at PDF (including some senior ones I respect) have positive opinions of Bangladesh.

They'd probably wish that we Bangladeshis did not confront bhakts so much and bash India in the process (necessary evil) - but being liberal-minded Bengalis themselves, most of them are not fond of Modi himself.

There is far more commonality of thought and narrative in being ethnic Bengalis, than not. This progressive liberalism of thought and capability of critical thinking and self-determinism as a society is not seen in other groups in India, as noted by the British administrators.

 

[hydrabadi_arab]

During the British period, the Muslims of Bengal abstained from learning either in English or in Bengali.

This continued until probably the 1930s when the education waves created by Maulana Muhammed Ali and Maulana Shawkat Ali reached our doors and our forefathers started to learn Bengali as well as the English language.

Bengali Hindus were far ahead of us and we remained backward. We started learning in English and Bengali only during the '30s.

Then came Pakistan and west Pakistanis wanted us to learn Urdu. But by the time Pakistan was formed, the Muslims of Bengal had already forgotten this language as well as Persian.

So, to study all the subjects in Urdu would have been suicidal to us in terms of job prospects and our future in the state of Pakistan. This is the reason why our people opposed the replacement of Bengali by Urdu.

I personally think the language movement was the right step we have taken.

I completely agree with you. Apart from some section of urban population, all rest suffered post 1947 in west Pakistan as well. This is why Sindhis starting revolting because all the government jobs were given to urdu speakers/muhajirs. They just had to show up and get a job because of urdu irrespective of education/degree. Thats when quota system was introduced based on region/area.

It have taken 74 years but now urdu is more or less acceptable to all. Pakistan shouldn't have declared urdu national language, especially in east Pakistan where you say they didn't teach it before 1947. At least in west Pakistan urdu was introduced along with British conquest. Anyway the end goal is what should matter and that was not being part of India.

 

[bluesky]

Hol up

View attachment 812379

This is a picture of Hussain Shahid Suhrawardy a former PM/ CM of Bengal Province before 1947. He also became the PM of Pakistan before 1958.

What is his relationship with the writer of this article?

 

[mb444]

I don't know if it is envy. But they do form the majority in West Bengal, so their opinion matters if Bangladesh wants to take absorb West Bengal as some members here have said.

People are joking dude... no serious BD would contemplate such self inflicted catastrophe.

We have trying since the formation of the bengal presidency to get away from west bengal.

 

[Bilal9]

I completely agree with you. Apart from some section of urban population, all rest suffered post 1947 in west Pakistan as well. This is why Sindhis starting revolting because all the government jobs were given to urdu speakers/muhajirs. They just had to show up and get a job because of urdu irrespective of education/degree. Thats when quota system was introduced based on region/area.

It have taken 74 years but now urdu is more or less acceptable to all. Pakistan shouldn't have declared urdu national language, especially in east Pakistan where you say they didn't teach it before 1947. At least in west Pakistan urdu was introduced along with British conquest. Anyway the end goal is what should matter and that was not being part of India.

Well all Pakistanis are our brothers regardless and always will be in Bangladesh. The time when regionalism and language politics was a driving force should be forgotten in this day and age of international trade and business. We should all learn Mandarin and English and go on with our lives by being members of the new age and make the region (South Asia) and world a better (and more prosperous) place.

Narrow regionalism and rivalries between common people only make petty dictators and their feudal cohorts richer. And we have them in every country in South Asia, especially Bangladesh.

Let Pakistan and Bangladesh patch up, mend fences (make people who capitalize on hate irrelevant) and that should be a lesson to India as well.

 

[cloud4000]

There are fringe groups in Bangladesh and India that support the creation of a greater Bengal, encompassing Bangladesh, West Bengal, Orissa, Assam, and Tripura strictly on cultural and linguistic grounds.

 

[Bengal71]

Pakistan and Bangladesh should make a military alliance. Assam, Tripura, Mizoram, Meghalaya and West Bengal go to Bangladesh to create greater Bangladesh. Kashmir, Punjab (including Himachal, Chandigarh and Haryana), Rajasthan, Gujarat and Agra go to Pakistan to create greater Pakistan.
Plus a land corridor should be made between our brotherly countries.
Rest of India should be Balkanized and made into our colonies.

hahah bro, too much dreaming. Dhire dhire ...

 

[SD 10]

Pakistan and Bangladesh should make a military alliance. Assam, Tripura, Mizoram, Meghalaya and West Bengal go to Bangladesh to create greater Bangladesh. Kashmir, Punjab (including Himachal, Chandigarh and Haryana), Rajasthan, Gujarat and Agra go to Pakistan to create greater Pakistan.
Plus a land corridor should be made between our brotherly countries.
Rest of India should be Balkanized and made into our colonies.

you cant even take care of todays Pakistan and you want more, what is wrong with you people..... We have enough landmass, dont need more. And no our problems will not majestically disappear once we gain more landmass, that's not how it works. We need better governance and uniform long-term policies. Stop this idiosyncrasies.

 

[Bilal9]

There are fringe groups in Bangladesh and India that support the creation of a greater Bengal, encompassing Bangladesh, West Bengal, Orissa, Assam, and Tripura strictly on cultural and linguistic grounds.

Such a theory is outlandish and the height of lunacy. Why ??

Bangladesh wants no part of Indian territory. Fringe groups don't decide anything in Bangladesh.

These are theories hatched by RSS/BJP in select West Bengal circles to enable "Panic" votes in that state to turn that state Saffron (and fat chance of that happening).

No one in Bangladesh is remotely thinking of such plans.

If they are then - I want some of the stuff they're smoking.

By the way - the writer of this lame article, the loser named Mohit Ray (per Wiki), was born in Kolkata in a displaced East Bengal refugee family - so clearly he has an axe to grind. Instead of going on with his life and excelling in either business or academia, this moron made the cause of "Persecuted minorities" in Bangladesh his cause du jour. He is actually not far off the mark in seeing business in this, because there are plenty of these angry refugee folks in Kolkata (displaced from Bangladesh). Some of them have succeeded in life and have moved on to other places in India. Others, like this loser, keep harping on "persecution of minorities" in Bangladesh, a bunch of malcontents.

Hindus in Bangladesh are a cossetted and cuddled minority. They get plum positions in senior govt. spots, and enjoy complete protection from law enforcement, especially during Puja and festivities. Hasina is very sensitive about this and does not want to give India any cause for blaming Bangladesh on "minority persecution", which Indian govt. does in any case, in baseless fashion.

Further, this idiot Mohit (like other refugees of his ilk) are trying to establish BJP rule in WB and are propagandists for Modi. Wiki says,

"He is a small-time BJP leader; he fought in the 2016 assembly election in Bengal from Jadavpur with a BJP ticket and lost.[4]

Unfortunately - for this loser Mohit, Kolkata is not turning into an anti-Muslim BJP stronghold anytime soon. The people who control and lead Kolkata businesses know that Bangladesh and its people are keeping Kolkata businesses alive. So - Dilli door aust....

 

[Lord Sheikh of the Bengal]

As West Bengal starts to become West Bangladesh, time to remember how Bangladesh was formed to realize the goals of Lahore Resolution​

• Guest Author | 30 January, 2022

Fifty years of the formation of Bangladesh is being celebrated quite enthusiastically in West Bengal. The spiritual bond of the Bengali language and culture between two Bengals is being rediscovered and championed. Bengali language movement of 1952 by the students of Dhaka University is also almost universally being accepted as the basis of the Bangladesh independence movement. The creation of Bangladesh is being portrayed as the emergence of a secular space on the eastern border of India. At this juncture, it is very important to expose this lie on the fiftieth anniversary of the formation of Bangladesh.

Whenever the word Pakistan is uttered, a negative picture of a strict Islamic country emerges. When East Pakistan became Bangladesh, most people felt relieved that there would be no Pakistan on our eastern border.

There was hope in West Bengal that it would no more be plagued with the constant influx of Hindu refugees from Islamic East Pakistan. And ‘secular’ Hindu Bengali historians, artists, intellectuals, political parties (even some Hindutva activists) painted a rosy sentimental picture about the newly formed country called Bangladesh.

But if we turn the page a little back, we will see that even after the partition of the country into Pakistan, the eastern wing of Pakistan was called East Bengal. In 1955 it was officially named East Pakistan. The name Pakistan (meaning Holy Land) was coined by Chowdhury Rahmat Ali after the names of the states of Punjab, Afghanistan, Kashmir, Sindh, and Baluchistan. There was no mention of Bengal in it. There is no mention of the word Pakistan in the Lahore resolution of 1940 which is considered as the basis and fundamental guide for creation of Pakistan. The Lahore resolution explicitly mentioned that “that the areas in which the Muslims are numerically in a majority as in the North-Western and Eastern Zones of India, should be grouped to constitute “Independent States” in which the constituent units shall be autonomous and sovereign”.

Eminent writer and political leader of East Pakistan/ Bangladesh, Abul Mansur Ahmed has explained it very clearly in his autobiographical book – “One Pakistan has been replaced by two Pakistans in accordance with Lahore Resolution.

The Government of India has assisted us in implementing the Lahore Resolution …. The Lahore resolution does not mention the word “Pakistan”, only the Muslim majority states. This means that the name of the states should be decided by the people later. The western people have named their state ‘Pakistan’. We, Easterners have named ours ‘Bangladesh’. There is no reason to be confused. ” (Amar Dekha Rajnitir Panchash Bachhar [Fifty Years of Politics As I Saw It] –pp. 808 3rd Ed. by Abul Mansur Ahmed, Naoroj Kitabistan, Dhaka, 1975).

East Bengal and West Bengal were formed on 20 June 1947 by a vote in the Bengal Legislative Assembly. All the Muslim members of the Bengal Legislative Assembly were against the division of Bengal and voted in favour of annexing the whole of Bengal to Pakistan. Those Muslim members demanded a united Bengal not to protect the language and culture of Bengal but to gain control over a larger landmass including the rich and prosperous city of Calcutta. Two most prominent political leaders in favour of a united Muslim-majority independent Bengal were Shaheed Suhrawardy and Sarat Chandra Bose. Muslim Leaguer Shaheed Suhrawardy was then Primer of Bengal and also infamous as ‘butcher of Calcutta’ because of his role in Great Calcutta Killings.

Congressman Sarat Chandra Bose was the brother of Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose.
Debates on the status of the Bengali language in Pakistan started from the time of the creation of Pakistan. Was it due to love for Bengali language and culture? After the partition of the country, all the Bengali newspapers published in East Bengal and who spoke in favour of the Bengali language had Arabic names – Paygam, Dainik Azad, Ittefaq, Insan, Insaf etc. The name of the most important organization championing Bengali language was Tamaddun Majlis. This is an Islamic example of love for the Bengali language. Bengali-speaking Muslims still name their children in Arabic.

On 23 February 1948, Dhirendranath Dutta, leader of Congress Party in in the Constituent Assembly of Pakistan demanded that Bengali be made the state language. He was supported by three Hindu members namely Premahari Barman, Bhupendra Kumar Dutta and Srishchandra Chattopadhyay. Prime Minister Liaquat Khan (elected from East Bengal) and Chief Minister of East Bengal Khwaja Nizamuddin vehemently opposed it. No Muslim member of East Bengal supported this demand. However, shortly the movement to make Bengali the state language was intensified due to economic reason.

In the words of Abul Mansur Ahmed, “If Urdu is made the state language, the educated society of East Pakistan will become ‘uneducated’ and ‘unfit’ for government service overnight. By replacing Persian with English as the state language in the mid-nineteenth century, British imperialism made the Muslim educated society “uneducated” and incapable of public service overnight.” (Purba Banglar Bhasa Andolan O Tatkaleen Rajnity [Language Movement of East Bengal and Politics of that Time]vol , pp 19 b Badaruddin Umar, Anandadhara Prakashan, Dhaka, 1970).

This was the crude reality of the Bengali language movement. Of course, the students of Dhaka University and a section of intellectuals added some emotional components associated with mother tongue. But love for mother tongue was not absolute. In an article published in December 1948, the eminent linguist and scholar Muhammad Shahidullah wrote:

“Language of religion has the place next to mother tongue. For this, I will say with all my heart, like Bangla we want Arabic. The birth of the state of Pakistan will be meaningful on the day when Arabic will be accepted as the state language of the whole of Pakistan”. (Pakistaner Rashtrabhasa Samasya [Problem of State Language of Pakistan], Dainik Azad, 29 July, 1947). The process of the Arabization of the Bengali language has been going on since then.
In 1954, Bengali became the state language of Pakistan. In all official notifications from currency notes to postage stamps Bengali was used along with Urdu. The language movement was over. But this victory of the Bengali language did not affect the ongoing persecution of Bengali speaking Hindus in East Bengal / East Pakistan. It continued as usual. In 1950, during the language movement, Jogendranath Mandal, the law minister of Pakistan, a leader of the Scheduled Caste Society, a supporter of the Pakistan movement, fled to India to save his life.
In this context, another myth about the sacrifices of Bengali speaking Muslims only for the Bengali language needs to be demolished. It is true that in 1952 police fired on agitating students of Dhaka University and four Bengali speaking Muslims (none of them were students of Dhaka University) were killed. But ‘secular’ intellectuals of both the Bengals consciously ignored the sacrifices of eleven Hindu Bengalis in the Bengali language movement in Silchar, Assam in 1961. Out of eleven martyrs nine were Hindu refugees from East Pakistan including a young girl named Kamala Bhattacharya. So Bengali speaking Hindus never had any mercy from the Bengali speaking Islamists in East Pakistan/ Bangladesh.

Since the creation of Pakistan, almost all the political parties of East Bengal/ East Pakistan had complained against discrimination by West Pakistan in all facets of life – jobs, education, industry, agriculture, trade. The first democratic election of East Bengal (not yet East Pakistan) was held in 1954. The United Front which won the election massively, was composed of four political parties of East Bengal, namely Awami Muslim League (later Awami League), KrishakShramik Party, Nezam-e-Islam and Ganatantrik Dal. The United front announced 21-point package programme in the election manifesto, drafted by Abul Mansur Ahmed of Awami Muslim League. The 19th point of the programme was – “The Lahore Resolution proposed full autonomy of East Bengal leaving defence, foreign affairs and currency only under the central government. In the matter of defence, arrangements shall be made to set the headquarters of the army in West Pakistan and the naval headquarters in East Bengal and to establish ordnance factories in East Bengal, and to transform Ansar force into a full-fledged militia equipped with arms”. However, the United Front government did not last long.

After a long period of military rule, a general election of Pakistan was held in 1970. Awami League under the leadership of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman won almost all the seats in East Pakistan and claimed to be invited to form the government. The basis of this huge election victory of Awami League was the six-point charter of demands framed in 1966.The first sentence of the first paragraph of the charter was, “Pakistan must be built into a true federation based on the historic Lahore resolution.” In other words, the Awami League had never deviated from the raison d’etre of creation of Pakistan. The six-point demands were all about East Pakistan’s economic issues. The last demand was the formation of an armed force for the security of East Pakistan (from Indian invasion). There was no mention of Bengali language and culture in the charter.

The military government of Pakistan and the major political parties of West Pakistan did not accept this victory of the Awami League and the following military intervention compelled Awami League to demand total separation from Pakistan. A so-called liberation war (MuktiYuddha) began. Historically such liberation wars go on for years and decades. Here, only nine months later, with a 14-day Indian military intervention gave birth to a new country – Bangladesh.

Politically, Bangladesh became a newly independent country with a new secular constitution. But, shortly within three years, Bangladesh rolled back to the old mould of Pakistan. The secular constitution was scrapped, Islam was made the state religion. The opening words ‘bismillah-ar-rahman-arrahim’ (In the name of Allah, the Beneficent, the Merciful), were added in 1997. Following the tradition of Pakistan, persecution of Hindus continued and at least ten million Bengali Hindus had been kicked out from Bangladesh in the last 50 years.

How are the Bengali Hindus Living there? After the attack on idols, temple vandalism and attacks on the Hindu community across Bangladesh during Durga Puja last October, 2021, prominent Bangladeshi educationist and writer Muhammad Zafar Iqbal (brother of the legendary writer Humayun Ahmed) wrote in one of his social media posts on October 19, 2021, “for last few days I am feeling myself impure. It seems that I am immersed in a dirty sewer. Not only me, but many people like me in this country have the same feeling, it seems that a large part of the nation is drowning in depression. The reason must be understood by everyone. Durga Puja, which is considered to be the biggest festival of Hindus, is at the center of the biggest violence this time. I can’t even comfort myself that this is an isolated incident. Starting from Comilla, it did not stop in Comilla, it spread all over the country. Which means there are horrible communal people all over the country, they are not hiding, they are open in public, proudly carrying out their operation. … ..When the time for Durga Puja comes, the work of making idols starts all over the country, since then I feel a kind of suppressed unrest inside myself. Inevitably I get the news that the idols are being smashed here and there in the country. When the puja starts, I hold my breath”.

Do you find any difference between Bangladesh and (East) Pakistan?

Famous Bengali writer and thinker Annadashankar Roy wrote – (during a visit of Dhaka after formation of Bangladesh) “We asked Sheikh (Mujibar) Saheb, ‘When did the idea of Bangladesh come to your mind?’ – He smiled and said, in 1947. I was a part of the team of Mr. Suhrawardy (then Prime Minister of United Bengal under British rule and known as ‘Butcher of Calcutta” for his alleged role in riot in Calcutta). He and Sarat Chandra Bose (brother of Netaji Subhash) wanted United Bengal. I (Mujib) also wanted a country for all Bengalis. ”

(Indrapat, Kando Priyo Desh, Kolkata, 1979, Quoted in Bangabandhu Kibhbe Amader Swadhinata Enechhilen [How Bangabadhu Gave Us Independence] pp15 by Muntasir Mamun, Maola Brothers, Dhaka, 2013)

Do the people of West Bengal smell anything? The slogan of ‘Joy Bangla’, very popular in Bangladesh, is nowadays being heard in the streets of West Bengal too. The ruling party of the state is popularizing this slogan to transform West Bengal into West Bangladesh to make their vote bank happy. In the fiftieth year of the formation of Bangladesh, the heirs of Sarat Chandra Bose and Suhrawardy are again dreaming of merging Hindu majority West Bengal into Islamic Bangladesh to fulfil the spirit of Lahore resolution. Even Hindutva activists have now become Gandhites and care less about these ‘communal’ issues.

Now it is time to wait for West Bengal t

West Bengal should be made part of Bangladesh.

Bangladesh should be identified as the Bengal. (Whereby West Bengal would feel at home).

o become West Bangladesh.

---

Author- Mohit Ray

The author is a well-known environmentalist, refugee rights activist and state committee member of BJP in West Bengal. He has authored a number of books on the environment and Bangladesh issues.

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