Week 97: Bangladesh Highlight
10/23/2021 - Modern Hindu Content
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This week we feature: a special on Bangladeshi Hindus and an Aesthetic
Special Highlight: Persecution of Bangladeshi Hindus
As many of our readers will be aware, last week was Navaratri, one of the largest Hindu festivals, and one celebrated with fervor throughout Hindu communities in many beautiful and different ways. Unfortunately, in Bangladesh, Navaratri was marked by a barrage of attacks on the Hindu community, including rapes, murders, destroyed temples, and stolen property. Given recent events, we wanted to provide an explainer on just how bad the situation for Hindus in Bangladesh is.
Background
As many readers will be aware, Bangladesh gained its independence with India’s help in 1971 following a bloody conflict between the Mukti Bahini (Bengali freedom fighters) and the Pakistan Army that ended soon after India intervened. During the war, Pakistani army members and Bengali collaborators (known as razakars) hunted Hindus down and killed them, resulting in the 1971 Bengali genocide in which up to 3 million people were killed, mostly Hindu. The first Bangladeshi leader, Mujibur Rahman, was a close associate of Muslim League leader Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy, who was instrumental in organizing death squads against Hindus during the 1946 Calcutta riots, though later he advocated for some form of secularism in Bangladesh.
Even after Bangladesh independence, Hindus were very clearly second class citizens. In 1988, the Bangladeshi Constitution was modified with clause 2A, which enshrined Islam as the state religion of Bangladesh. The Enemy Property Act (now Vested Property Act) has been used by the Bangladeshi government to steal over 3 million acres of Hindu land, and millions of dollars worth of Hindu properties. The population percentage of Hindus, which was nearly a quarter of the population in 1971, has fallen to around 6-7% in recent estimates, due to persecution and killings driving immigration, mostly to India. In the past decade, there have been nearly 4,000 attacks on Hindu communities in Bangladesh!
Recent Attacks
Attacks on Hindus during Navaratri started after social media rumors spread that Hindus had placed a Quran at the feet of a murti in a temple in Comilla; this was termed as blasphemy by Muslims (and later turned out to be the handiwork of a Muslim named Iqbal Hossain). After that, all across Bangladesh, Hindu temples and homes were attacked, and Hindu communities terrorized. One estimate from the Daily Star suggests that 101 religious sites and at least 180 homes were attacked in the six days following the incident, leaving hundreds homeless and unable to earn an income. Additionally at least 10 people have been killed so far, including two sadhus from ISKCON, and multiple women have been raped, including a 10-year old girl, who later passed away.
The are unfortunately many videos of the atrocities including Temple destruction in Sutradhar Bari, burning of homes in Chandpur, and an attack on a temple in Mirpur.
Additionally, Twitter banned the Bangladesh Hindu Unity Council and ISKCON Bangladesh accounts on October 19 at the request of the Bangladeshi government, after both had been updating followers on the situation and raising awareness on new attacks. Bangladesh has also restricted or shut down internet completely in many areas, which means any reports aggregating atrocities are likely heavily undercounting.
To learn more about various incidents that occurred, we recommend checking out Stories of Bengali Hindus on Instagram, Twitter, and their Website. Another good instagram follow is Bengali Hindus. The That’s so Hindu podcast also has a good episode breaking down what occurred, links provided to Apple Podcasts and Spotify.
Aesthetic: Andhra Pradesh Temple
