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PaperclipPerfector  3mo ago (text post)   1356 thread views

Transnational Thursday for August 8, 2024

Transnational Thursday is a thread for people to discuss international news, foreign policy or international relations history. Feel free as well to drop in with coverage of countries you’re interested in, talk about ongoing dynamics like the wars in Israel or Ukraine, or even just whatever you’re reading.

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Anyone here familiar with the situation in Bangladesh? Most of the news reports I’ve seen seem pretty trash, and I don’t trust them anyway. I’ve seen some videos of Muslims trashing Hindu temples, but lack context.

Multiple bad incentives aligning is what's happening.

India was critical to the independence of Bangladesh, and both countries have generally had an amiable relationship. India has been a big proponent of turning Bangladesh into a somewhat secular nation. It is still 92% Muslim, with 8% Hindus.

Bad incentives:

  • Muslims have always oppressed Hindu minorities. So, the tensions have precedent. Using one against the other is Muslim politics 101.
  • Hasina is seen as the secular leader, so anti Sheikh Hasina riots have turned into anti-hindu riots.
  • Hasina is seen to be a close to India, so protestors are turning anti India. India has a major illegal-immigration problem from Bangladesh, so Indian public rhetoric is slightly anti-Bangladeshi right now, which has fanned the flames. Anti-India riots have turned into anti-hindu riots.
  • As Hasina pushed her opposition into a corner, they relied on the far-right (practically violent Islamists) for new rhetoric. Bangladesh has undergone massive Islamization (as has Pakistan & Maldives), and they genuinely want to destroy temples and beat up Hindus.
  • India is a non-retaliating big-brother of a terribly run subcontinent. So when leaders in Bangladesh/Nepal/Pakistan/Maldives fuck up, they love to point fingers towards India to move blame away from themselves. Free lunch.

This is coupled with some really odd global incentives which empowers the anti-hindu lynch mob:

  • India insists on being non-aligned. So CIA wants to find other means to counter balance China. Keeping the neighborhood unstable is to their benefit. Bringing down Hasina is so they can establish control in the chaos.
  • Ivy league students are stupid & uninformed. Hasina was running an authoritarian pseudo-democracy. She was still the most democratic and liberal choice by a country mile. Ivy league kids don't care, they started opposing her.
  • Indian muslims & left work together with global orgs to attack Modi's BJP from the outside. So Left-Muslim nexus is strong. Left doesn't want to bring light to hindus being persecuted by muslims because it ruins the narrative.
  • Hasina's reaction led to 100s of dead students. Global ivy-league kids had friends their age who died. So anti-Hasina and pro-islamist sentiment was purchased by west wholesale.

Truth is, Hindus are 2nd only to Jews in being lynched & exiled from every historic homeland. From Malaysia (whose Hindus ended up forming Singapore) to Afghanistan (which may be my family's ancestral home....20% chance), majority Islam has shown itself to be incompatible with Hinduism. There might be a bunch of incentives this time around, but this is a movie we Hindus have seen before.

Bangladesh was originally a part of Pakistan but had a sizeable Hindu population. Even in the infamous Bengali genocide which was committed by Pakistani Army, the Bengali Hindus were dis-proportionally targeted. So there is a large history of communal tensions in Bangladesh. Infact, when in India, the controversial Babri Masjid was demolished by a crowd of mobs, there was a backlash in Bangladesh where Hindu minority was targetted.

As many would know recently there was an uprising in Bangladesh which overthrew the reigning PM Sheikh Hasina, daughter of the Founding Father of Bangladesh, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman. Sheikh Hasina in power had made changes to election process which gave the reigning PM power to overlook the election rather than an interim government which was traditionally done. The sham elections that followed gave her quite a bit of power. The student protests which were originally about Freedom Fighter reservation quotas in government jobs, spilled over into a popular uprising resulting in her ouster.

She occupied a more secular space in the Bengali polity and was pro-India, and kept extreme Islamists in check. So after her ouster, the Hindu community without state protection and being seen as a Hasina supporters were especially vulnerable. Though in Urban areas protesting students took upon themselves to protect vulnerable communities from Islamist backlash, this is much less the case in non-Urban areas.

The situation is still developing and we cannot say if the interim government will able to reign in the chaos, but probably hope so.

Nobel Laureate Muhammad Yunus chosen as the interim leader is a well respected figure in Bangladesh, but his political ability is unknown. On the other hand Bangladesh Nationalist Party and Jamaat-e-Islami are fuming over the lack of control over interim government.

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