Our intellectuals imbibed the idea and dreamt of a nation-state. They brought disaster upon us, with the death of 700,000 people (this is the figure given by Albert Reynolds, who rejected the Indian figure of 3 million; that's plausible, for otherwise we would have to believe that the Pakistan army had been more efficient than the American military which killed 5 million Vietnamese after dropping more bombs than in the entire second world war).
But ideas never travel, only words do. In their conception of a nation-state based on the Bengali language, there was glaring incoherence. The Bengali language is spoken across the border in the Indian state of West Bengal. These people are Hindu, and from the beginning until now, nationalists have been pro-India and pro-Hindu. But this is a denial of nationalism. For a nationalist, the nation-state must be sufficient unto itself, with no external loyalties. No nationalist can consistently make the assertion that we are a nation-state and that at the same time we belong to the Indic civilization.
My wife and I spent an evening with a top-ranking bureaucrat. He was an ardent nationalist. He kept a picture of Sheikh Mujib, the father of Bengali nationalism, in his office even when it was illegal to do so. He told us that he didn't believe in the Abrahamic god who demanded loyalty. He was more at home with the likes of Apollo and the Hindu pantheon. With considerable pride, he showed us an instrument for embossing Shiva on his stationery. We ran from his house.
Yet the bureaucrat is typical of a nationalist in Bangladesh. My parents were nationalists and they loved Hinduism. As an agnostic myself, I find it impossible to comprehend how one can love any religion. All religions are equally good or bad.
Indeed, nationalism itself is a religion. It has all the seven dimensions of a religion as adumbrated by Ninian Smart in his The World's Religions (see The Two Religions of Bangladesh). It is small wonder that I have never felt any affinity for nationalism.
Further, Bengali nationalism is not a shared idea. The mass of Bangladeshis have no conception of a Bengali nation-state. The elite and the people lead separate lives. I once investigated the role of cinemas in Bangladeshi life. In the cinema halls, I saw mostly day labourers, rickshaw pullers and garments factory workers - no gentleman or lady. In newspapers and on TV, the latter decry the tastes of the former, looking down their collective noses. An interview of people was conducted by a television channel, and it was found that no one could identify the meaning of a certain historically important nationalist day. That nationalism - which implies a total collective - is not shared by most people must be a source of considerable embarrassment for the elite nationalists.
And even among the elite, there is no loyalty to the nation-state. Almost all of my cousins live in the United States. One of the worst things about being a teacher in Bangladesh is the sure knowledge that most of your students will quit the country for good. When a student goes to the principal of Notre Dame College for a reference, he lectures him on his duty to study abroad and then come back to the country. I'm not against emigration: but in Bangladesh it is the children of the well-to-do who emigrate, not those down-at-heel. When taking a flight from Kuwait, one encounters a long queue of Bangladeshis returning to their country. These people are labourers, they have nothing but the power to labour. These workers are widely employed in the Middle East and it is their remittance that helps pay for our imports. I would not mind the least if America took these people, but America takes the best minds - it is called brain drain.
Again, from the very initiation of Bangladesh, there has been rejection of its status. This was the reaction of the Chakmas of the Chittagong Hill Tracts. Our nationalism bred a new nationalism, and the whole of the Chittagong Hill Tracts demanded autonomy. The Chakmas don't speak a different language, but speak a dialect of Bengali. But that was enough to alienate them from Bengali nationalism. In this, they anticipated the English-speaking Scottish nationalists. An insurgency ensued in the south-east, and we did what West Pakistan did to us when we wanted autonomy - we attacked them militarily. Rebellion always brings swift retaliation.
Our nationalists take pride in being a Bengali nation-state. But do we have a state at all? We are totally dependent on western foreign aid. Without aid, Bangladesh would have ceased to exist. That is cause for shame, not pride.
The elite of Bangladesh also suffer from cultural cringe. This is a feeling of inferiority to western civilisation. The feeling dates back to colonial times, and was successfully inculcated in us by British imperialists. We admire all things western - including their political system. When somebody is praised by westerners, newspapers rush to print the story and the individual is lionised. There are over 10,000 NGOs in Bangladesh, financed by western donors. We have become an outpost of western civilisation. We should be able to stand up and say: non serviam.
Our inspiration comes from Europe, but what is Europe today? Not a congeries of nation-states
Each sequestered in its hate
but a supranational union with its own currency, its own bureaucracy, its own judiciary and its own parliament. Europe has been through two terrible wars, and it wants to shun that path forever.
Does all this mean we must be fundamentalists? Let's look at Persian and Arabic literature. The Gulistan is an entirely secular work of art. Omar Khayyam was a hedonist and atheist. The Arabian Nights is very earthy literature, modeled on the Persian Hezar Afsane. The Perfumed Garden is the Kamasutra of the Arabic world. The Shahnama is based on ancient Iranian fables. Ferdousi wrote:
Besi ranj bordam
Dar in sale si
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