Commitment to Secularism

Communal violence against Bangladesh’s Hindu communities during the Durga Puja festival in October 2021 has revived debates surrounding the country’s ambivalent stance on secularism. At this critical juncture, rights activists have demanded the restoration of the 1972 Constitution that visualized a secular polity. However, insiders in the Sheikh Hasina-led Awami League government believe that efforts to restructure the body politic by removing Islam as the state religion will incite civil unrest and derail economic growth.

These concerns aren’t entirely unwarranted as religion remains a delicate matter in Bangladesh and cannot be easily extricated from state affairs. Even a cursory glimpse at the country’s history would reveal that religious factions have continually attempted to elbow away secular values.

In 1971, Bangladesh declared itself a secular state insofar as no one faith would be permitted to assume centrality in government affairs. The preamble to the Constitution stated that secularism was among the four basic pillars of the state along with democracy, nationalism and socialism. Even so, secularism remained a somewhat contentious ideal and Islam continued to exert a strong influence in the political realm. For instance, the Education Commission in 1973 discovered that a vast majority of the country’s Muslim population wanted access to religious education. As per credible reports, the number of Qawmi and Alia madrassas operating within the country have grown exponentially over the decades.

The seeds of Bangladesh’s Islamization process were sown under the tenure of military dictator Ziaur Rehman. The roots of this transformation in statecraft were nourished and solidified when his successor Hussein Muhammad - another military ruler - declared Islam to be the state religion in 1988. Despite this adjustment to the country’s constitutional framework, secularism continues to remain a vital - albeit tenuous - blueprint for the functioning of the state.

Under the incumbent government, secular ideals seem to have been flouted as hard-line religious groups have fuelled bigotry and fundamentalism. Driven by political expediency, the Awami League government has only sought to reach compromises with these radical forces and done little to curb their influence in eroding the secular space. As a result, these elements have been emboldened by the tacit support they have received from the ruling elite. It is, therefore, not surprising that they have managed to subtly push the boundaries to facilitate their ideological agenda. Elements of state policy that are believed to be inconsistent with Islam have been vociferously rejected. In recent years, secular content in school textbooks has been removed and replaced with seemingly religious material.

In addition, minority groups have been most affected by the shrinking secular space. Violence and the excessive subjugation of marginalized communities have become the norm. Hindus have invariably faced the onslaught of bigotry. If statistics issued by the rights organization Ain-o-Salish Kendra are to serve as a gauge, around 3,710 attacks have reportedly been carried out against Hindus between January 2013 and September 2021. Analysts have viewed these attacks as an attempt to force Hindus to flee so that their properties can be seized. Even so, the issue runs deeper than the question of material gain and reflects the extent to which religious intolerance can act as a catalyst for violence.

The heinous attack at this year’s Durga Puja festival can be easily attributed to an administrative failure on the part of law-enforcement agencies and other state functionaries. Soon after the incident, the Awami League government deployed the Bangladesh Border Guard in 22 districts to provide much-needed support to the civilian agencies. However, these cosmetic measures cannot alter the cold fact that the government’s existing politics of appeasement has strengthened the yoke of these religious elements to an unprecedented degree. A concerted effort is required to quell the rising tide of religious intolerance in Bangladesh. The ruling elite must recognize the shortcomings associated with achieving this goal without a constitutional amendment. The government’s ambiguous stance on the matter needs to be rectified as it will continue to weaken Bangladesh’s overarching state identity.

In mid-October, the State Minister of Information, Murad Hassan threw his weight behind plans to restore the 1972 Constitution and bring the country back on a secularist path. Unfortunately, Hassan’s views haven’t been echoed by the government as an amendment to the Constitution could generate anarchy. Even so, the ruling regime needs to find a more holistic solution to end the scourge of violent radicalism in Bangladesh through constitutional means.

An effective means of accomplishing this task is to broaden the understanding of secularism at the state and societal levels. Conventional wisdom would have us believe that secularism thrives on a strict separation of religion and the state. Such idealistic notions have been vehemently discredited as religious precepts continue to hold sway in matters of statecraft. Modern manifestations of secularism focus on its influence in maintaining an equal distance between all religions without allowing one faith or belief system to dominate others. This is the model of secularism that was envisaged for Bangladesh. The government needs to skillfully engage in a balancing act that gives effect to the principles enshrined in the 1972 Constitution. For this purpose, Bangladesh will need to revert the vision of secularism that was espoused by its founding father. This can only be accomplished without any obstructions if all the stakeholders comprehend the essence of the secularist ideals that govern Bangladesh’s polity. No solution can be sought in the absence of a consensus on what the state’s commitment to secularism means for all religious communities in the country.