Bangladesh: Bloggers discussing cinema, politics, health, photography and history

(First published in Global Voices Online)

The Bangladeshi film industry nicknamed Dhallywood used to produce decent films for the Bangladeshi society. But with the competition of superior quality pictures from Hollywood and Bollywood, which conquered Bangladesh market and the people with the help of cheap bootleg VCD/DVDs, Dhallywood was in trouble in the last decade. Keeping the strict censorship rule in a predominantly Muslim society in mind, the Dhallywood producers invented new ways to attract viewers with saucier and violent scenes as well as stories and using colorful explicit posters.



Shafiur of imperfect world 2008 shares 8 posters from his collection of almost 500 posters to let us have an idea of what Dhallywood offers now- a- days. Click on the image to view those.

Politics

“The rule of law is essential for society to live without fear. For it to apply, it must start at the top.”

World renowned photojournalist Shahidul Alam comments the above in a photo essay on the existing rule of law (or the absence of it) in Bangladesh. Click here for the photo essay.

Health

Recently an email about maltreatment and death of a patient in a Dhaka clinic was widely circulated among the Bangladeshis. Life in Eskaton posts it to portray the sorry state of the private clinics who are just cash mongers and negligent in service.

The blogger shares another story about his father’s MRI investigation in a diagnostic center in Dhaka. Being a heart patient he had to take some cautions. His mother detected that from a display in a board and rushed to alert doctors before they proceeded with the investigation.

He asks:

"Lucky for us, my mother is a sensible woman. And a person who could read English instructions being used as decorative items inside the hospital. What if it was some innocent man from a rural area who can’t read? How can one accept negligence of this magnitude from doctors who appear so smart and intelligent?"

Photography



Russell John posts in BP Blog (Official Blog of Bangladeshi Photographers) a collage of 110 photos which are on display in the Sidr Aid Photography Exhibition 2008 being held in Dhaka.

History

There is a controversy in Bangladesh brewed by the dynastic political descendants of two architects of Bangladesh’s liberation - the father of the nation and ex-prime minister Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and ex-president General Ziaur Rahman, on the issue of who declared the independence of Bangladesh. We have seen text books have been rewritten during the tenure of BNP (headed by Zia’s wife Khaleda Zia) and Awamy League (headed by Shiekh Mujib’s daughter Sheikh Hasina) claiming their versions of the history.

Blogger Mashuqur Rahman and freedom fighter and liberation war historian M. M. Rahman Jalal did an extensive research on this and published the revealing facts. Please read the post to find out the truth.

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Indoor politics is back in Bangladesh: what next?

At last the stranglehold on Bangladesh politics has been relaxed for the better. Today the chief of Caretaker (interim) Government has declared in a televised speech to the nation that:

* announced an end to a long-running ban on indoor politics from Monday.
* no more cases would be filed and nobody would be harassed in connection with the incidents at Dhaka University and other public universities across the country late August.
* the national taskforce on corruption would not publish any new list of corruption suspects after the current month.
* there may be some mistakes his government made as there were mistakes by any government.
* repeated his pledge to transfer power to elected public representatives after arranging the elections by the 2008 deadline.



(video courtesy Voice of Bangladeshi Bloggers)

But what sort of politics can we expect when the supreme leaders of the major political parties are behind bars? There are already split within major parties. The Economist slammed the apparent minus two solution and comments:

this is not a country preparing for a return to democratic politics. The BNP is in a mess. Hours before her arrest, Khaleda Zia expelled Mannan Bhuiyan, the BNP's secretary-general, for “a conspiracy to split the party”. The League, for its part, has found it impossible to part with Sheikh Hasina, who remains popular. No self-respecting politician will enter the fray while the army runs the show. Mohammad Yunus, a Nobel-prize-winning microcredit pioneer once seen as a potential candidate to fill the political vacuum, floated a party earlier in the year, but has scrapped plans to enter politics.

...diplomats say that the present regime is “the only game in town”. The generals' secular stance and tough opposition to Islamist extremism still make them attractive to Western governments. But with the two big parties decapitated, the fear is that the Islamists, both the mainstream and a more radical margin, will profit from the political vacuum and growing economic discontent.

Update: Zafa analyzes the speech in a writeup in E-Bangladesh.

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The state of the leadership

Ahmede Hussain interviews Sajeeb Wajed Joy, Sheikh Hasina's son. He says:

"I believe that the Awami League is going to come to power. The party is far stronger now than it has ever been. My mother is within the party and so even while she is outside the country, the party will follow her leadership. I believe the people of our country will oppose this regime just as they opposed the attempted rigged elections."

However, the reality might be different as the law adviser Mainul Hosein says about the failed exile attempt of Sheikh Hasina and Khaleda Zia:

"The government was told by people from within the parties that if the two leaders stay in the country, necessary reforms in the parties cannot be carried out."

So Shadakalo's earlier prediction that fractions within Awami League and BNP will benefit from the exile of the two leaders may be true. How Hasina will tackle them?

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Which came first? The fallacious arguments:

The controversy regarding the first proclaimer of independence of Bangladesh lingers on as the BNP government (led by Khaleda Zia, the wife of late president Ziaur Rahman) reprinted the history of the Liberation war with an amendment. The new one states that he is the first proclaimer of independence which was not clearly stated in the earlier version. The proclamation issue is rather controversial as Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, in his famous speech on March 7, 1971 declared sovereignty from Pakistan and declared that if he could not give any formal order in time, let the people defend their country themselves at their discretion. On March 26, 1971 following the crackdown of Pakistani Army, Zia, then a Major of Eighth East Bengal Regiment mutinied with his fellow officers and soldiers in Chittagong. He found his way to the rebel radio broadcasting center Swadhin Bangla Betar Kendra. He proclaimed Bangladesh as an independent country on March 26, 1971 and it is said that he did it first without mentioning Sheikh Mujib's name. It was the local Awami league leaders who persuaded Zia to give the proclamation on behalf of Sheikh Mujib and thus his famous March 27, 1971 speech was aired numerous times. There are other such claims to add further controversy about which one is the first proclamation. In 1977, Zia (then President) undertook the project to collect Liberation War documents and compile them into a comprehensive historical documentation. Renowned journalist and poet Hasan Hafizur Rahman edited the book titled 'Bangladesher Swadhinota Juddho: Dalilpatra' (The Liberation War of Bangladesh: Documents). Publication of its 15 volumes completed in 1986. Zia never had any urge to portray himself as the first proclaimer or make any fuss about it.

Now the point is, our political acrimony between the Sheikh Mujib's Awami League & Zia's BNP is so unhealthy, that the both parties failed to give respect to the both undisputed leaders. You cannot undermine the efforts of one of them. Zia's first proclamation did not include Sheikh Mujibur Rahman's name but it did not mean that he had any apprehension about Mujib's leadership. And it is really unfair of the Awami League supporters to ignore Zia's initiatives to proclaim formally when Sheikh Mujibur Rahman was already in army custody on March 26, 1971.

I really see no merit in establishing one leader above another leader. They all played their part just like every countrymen and Sheikh Mujibur Rahman is the undisputed father of nation.

I hope that the Awami league supporters cease to undermine Zia's contribution and wish that the BNP supporters try not to erase Sheikh Mujib and the past putting Zia on the top. And no matter who proclaimed first, the both leaders are in our hearts; Bangladesh is independent now and we have to look forward for progress.

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