[🇧🇩] The Legacy of Maulana Bhashani

[Saif]

Date Occurred: Nov 18, 2024

Remembering a legacy of opposition, a vision of independence

VISUAL: ALIZA RAHMAN

Maulana Abdul Hamid Khan Bhashani (1880–1976) was one of Bengal's most charismatic and influential leaders, whose political contributions and multifaceted personality have been the subject of extensive evaluation. His leadership in the anti-colonial struggle, uncompromising efforts to unite the impoverished peasants of Bengal to alleviate their suffering, and his tireless political journey in pursuit of democracy were monumental. However, his enduring legacy lies in his steadfast commitment to oppositional politics and his vision of independence, which remain vital for sustaining democratic politics.

Maulana Bhashani's political journey began in the 1920s with his involvement in the Khilafat and non-cooperation movements in Bengal. However, Bhashani, at that time, did not become a prominent figure in Bengal politics like his contemporaries AK Fazlul Haq, Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy, Akram Khan, or Abul Hashim. Rather towards the late 1920s, he was compelled to move to Assam by landlords in Tangail, Pabna and Bogura because he organised peasants to protest against the landlords' exploitation. The Maulana rose to political prominence in Assam, where he popularised the Muslim League, and eventually served as its president. Bhashani became especially known for his opposition to the line corridor movement. Later, Muhammad Sa'dullah's Assam government arrested him. He was released in late 1947 on the condition that he would permanently leave Assam.

After relocating to Dhaka, Bhashani witnessed the Bengal Muslim League governing the province in an increasingly autocratic manner, continuing to perpetuate the suffering of the people even after Pakistan's independence. In response, he founded the East Pakistan Awami Muslim League in June 1949. Through his tireless efforts and extensive travels across East Bengal, the party rapidly gained traction, drawing many young people and disillusioned factions of the Muslim League. Bhashani played a crucial role in the United Front's victory in the 1954 elections, which delivered a decisive blow to the ruling Muslim League.

Bhashani also played a significant role in the party's evolution by advocating for the removal of "Muslim" from its name, renaming it the Awami League, and opposing separate electorates for minorities, a position supported by leaders like Suhrawardy in 1956. Ultimately, Bhashani left the Awami League due to disagreements over East Pakistan's autonomy, growing frustrated as the then Prime Minister Suhrawardy, whose stance was increasingly aligned with the US, ignored this crucial issue.

Notably, Bhashani was a trailblazer in anti-communal politics, staunchly opposing religious bigotry and hatred during the heightened sectarian tensions surrounding India's partition. He played a key role in establishing Ittefaq and revitalising Sangbad as a pro-people voice. These publications left an enduring legacy in shaping democratic opinion in both Pakistan and Bangladesh.

The Kagmari Conference of 1957, chaired by Bhashani, was one of the most influential cultural-literary-political gatherings in Pakistan. It challenged the restrictive socio-cultural environment and rejuvenating ties between East Bengal and West Bengal. Serving as a vibrant hub for both folk and modern literary circles, it fostered dynamic cultural exchange and drew significant public participation. During the conference, Bhashani and his leftist colleagues championed an anti-imperialist, non-aligned foreign policy, a stance that faced fierce opposition from Awami League leaders, making a split inevitable.

Bhashani aspired to steer the Awami League towards anti-imperialist, anti-feudal, and anti-communal principles. When this vision could not be realised, he founded the National Awami Party (NAP) in 1957 to pursue his mission independently.

Later, when Ayub Khan seized power, Bhashani appeared to adopt a cautious approach, refraining from strong opposition to strategically navigate the early years of military rule. He even offered concessions to Ayub, as reflected in his remark, "Don't disturb Ayub." This stance might have been influenced by broader global politics, particularly Ayub and Bhashani's mutual alignment with China and the dynamics of the 1965 Indo-Pak war, which shaped Bhashani's periodic inaction towards Ayub's regime.

Unfortunately, NAP later split along ideological lines, driven by debates over the Sino-Soviet conflict, despite not being a communist party.

However, this same Maulana later delivered the final blow to Ayub Khan's regime, igniting a grassroots movement that swept from cities to villages and ultimately contributed to the downfall of Pakistan's "great dictator."

In the final stage of his life, while reflecting on the most significant event of his life, in response to a question from a physician, Bhashani recounted the struggles of the people of the Indian subcontinent, particularly in Bengal, against British colonial rule. He said, this historic movement did not achieve complete liberation but, its partial success brought him immense joy. He spoke with pride about how the people of Bengal fought for their own freedom and contributed to the broader struggle for independence across the subcontinent.

However, by this time, NAP had been significantly weakened as many of his young communist associates defected to pursue more radical paths. These departures further destabilised the party, leaving it vulnerable on the eve of Pakistan's first national elections. Bhashani's bold and action-oriented politics, meanwhile, unsettled many in the middle class, prompting them to shift their support to the Awami League, which appeared to offer a more stable and pragmatic alternative.

Bhashani's decision not to contest the 1970 elections further compounded the challenges for his party, NAP. This decision weakened the party's position as the second-most significant political force after the Awami League, causing it to lose even more ground.

Despite this, Bhashani remained a pivotal figure during the 1971 Liberation War. His unwavering support for the war effort brought immense legitimacy to the cause and played a crucial role in garnering global attention towards Bangladesh's struggle for independence.

After the liberation of Bangladesh, Bhashani continued to exert significant influence by holding the ruling Awami League accountable on critical issues such as drafting the constitution and addressing the food crisis. His last major political initiative was the historic march protesting the Farakka Barrage issue, underscoring his enduring commitment to national causes.

Bhashani's political journey was marked by shifting trajectories and evolving strategies, often reflecting the complexities of his time. During the Pakistan period, he was perceived by some as sympathetic to India. However, following Bangladesh's independence, his actions were criticised as overly anti-Indian, with some attributing these stances to heightened communal tensions in the nascent country.

In the final stage of his life, while reflecting on the most significant event of his life, in response to a question from a physician, Bhashani recounted the struggles of the people of the Indian subcontinent, particularly in Bengal, against British colonial rule. He said, this historic movement did not achieve complete liberation but, its partial success brought him immense joy. He spoke with pride about how the people of Bengal fought for their own freedom and contributed to the broader struggle for independence across the subcontinent.

When he was asked why he always led the opposition but never took power, Maulana Bhashani explained that political power alone cannot guarantee the well-being of the people or eliminate all forms of discrimination. He emphasised that throughout his life, he championed political, economic, social, and cultural independence, urging people to strive for these goals. This did not mean he rejected power entirely; rather, he believed in waiting for the right conditions to achieve true independence in all its forms.

His response captured the essence of his identity as a leader of the oppressed and underscored his unwavering commitment to remaining in opposition throughout his political journey.

Priyam Paul is a journalist and researcher.​

 

[Saif]

Our foremost peasant leader and revolutionary

He was described as an epic hero. His life was intimately involved in the land, labour and language of the poor peasant.

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Our foremost peasant leader and revolutionary

Maulana Bhashani speaking at one of his mass rallies. Photo: Archives

He was described as an epic hero. His life was intimately involved in the land, labour and language of the poor peasant. And he was always with sharecroppers and fisherfolk, rickshaw wallas and jute and sugar producers, industrial workers and farm labourers, the urban poor and shopkeepers and primary school teachers, and other segments of the "Wretched of the Earth," to use the Black revolutionary Frantz Fanon's phrase. And—clad in his spotless white panjabi while always wearing his favourite lungi and tupi—he remained opposed to everything our ruling classes have hitherto come to stand for.

I'm speaking of none other than Maulana Abdul Hamid Khan Bhashani, proverbially known as the majloom jononeta (leader of the oppressed), one who was perhaps the most popular revolutionary peasant leader from Bangladesh. He organised and led the poor peasants from East Bengal to settle in a river island called Bhashan Char in colonial Assam—a place where he lived and was loved by its people, who gave him the title "Bhashani." This is reminiscent of how the Argentine revolutionary Ernesto Guevara came to be lovingly called "Che" in Cuba, which, however, was not the place of his birth.

According to most, if not all, sources, Maulana Bhashani was born on December 2, 1880, in a poor peasant family, in a village called Dhangara, in the present-day district of Sirajganj. His father Sharafat Ali Khan died at 36, when Bhashani—then nicknamed Chyaga Mia—was about nine. Then he lost his mother Maziran Bibi, his grandmother, his two brothers, and his sisters to the 1894 epidemic. Chyaga Mia not only became an orphan, but also lost almost everyone when he was only about 14.

Yet, Chyaga Mia somehow succeeded in getting his elementary education at a small madrasa in Sirajganj. Later, in 1907, Pir Nasiruddin Shah Baghdadi sent him to Darul Uloom Deoband—then the leading centre of Islamic learning in India. Following that time, Bhashani's life had been an epic journey marked by relentless struggles against poverty, death, damage, destruction—and, of course, against all forms and forces of oppression and injustice he could possibly identify.

Bhashani died on November 17, 1976, at the age of 96.

Owing to space constraints, I can barely scratch the surface of Bhashani's staggeringly eventful life and work. But I intend to follow only a few tracks and trajectories that I find significant. Overall, the political life of Maulana Bhashani encompassed three geographical sites—Assam, Pakistan and Bangladesh—and three broad historical periods such as the colonial (Bitish India), neocolonial (Pakistan), and "postcolonial" (Bangladesh) periods, spanning six decades from, say, coming into contact with Deshbandhu Chittaranjan Das in 1917 that inaugurated Bhashani's political life (it was also the heady year of the great October Revolution of Russia), to organising and leading East Bengal's peasants in Bhashan Char in 1924, to leading the famous anti-Farakka long march in Bangladesh in 1976.

Avowedly anti-capitalist, anti-colonial, anti-imperial, and anti-feudal—one who uncompromisingly combatted British colonialism, the zamindari system, and all forms and forces of class politics represented by parties ranging from the Congress to the Muslim League to the Awami League and the like—Maulana Bhashani was characteristically and unwaveringly oppositional in the interest of the oppressed, as the peasant leader Haji Mohammad Danesh rightly pointed out. Bhashani was known as a socialist, even a "Maoist," Islamic socialist, Islamist, Pir, spiritual leader, and so on. But by no means did he ever resemble any one of them in the run-of-the mill sense. In fact, neither so-called socialists nor so-called Islamists endorsed Bhashani's positions and practices.

Yet, it was Bhashani who—more than any leader on the left—made socialism popular at a particular historical juncture. Bhashani also underlined the political and even revolutionary potential of spiritual projects—Islam included. His decisively anti-communal version of Islam—informed and inflected by his deep understanding of the notion of Hukumat-e-Rabbania, which urges us to remain organically tied to the totality of life forms—was deeply resonant with the cause of the oppressed. In this, Bhashani edged close to the revolutionary poet Kazi Nazrul Islam. It was, then, not for nothing that the retrograde Jamaat-e-Islami party called Bhashani kafir (Nazrul was also called kafir in a different context).

Let me quickly allude to a creative moment in Bhashani's brand of socialist cultural politics. At mass gatherings, Bhashani used to say prayers—in the manner of what is called munajat in the Islamic tradition—and once he said something to this effect in his mass munajat: "Allah, keep our communists safe!" There were indeed numerous other moments that amply attest to the maulana's breathtaking creativity, tactical flexibility and, of course, his principled oppositionality—all in the service of the oppressed. Let me make a few more points about Bhashani's oppositional politics.

Bhashani joined the Swaraj Party of Deshbandhu Chittaranjan in 1923, and then had his fiercely antagonistic confrontation with the Maharaja of Santosh, for which Bhashani was expelled from Mymensingh. In fact, in 1926, Bhashani was declared persona non grata in his own land: Bengal. Since then, however, he never ceased to act and agitate; he emerged as the most outstanding peasant leader by organising in 1931 the largest peasant rally ever held in Bengal during the British colonial period. Indeed, he organised, led, and took part in numerous rebellions and riots, resistance movements, mass uprisings, marches, protests, rallies, and so on—including, of course, the 1952 Language Movement, the 1969 Mass Uprising—of which he was an unparalleled and most exemplary leader—and the 1971 Liberation War itself. I intend to write about his distinctive and massive roles in all those three historic events on another occasion. For now, let me call attention to just a few, if not all, pioneering moments that characterised Bhashani's insurrectionary politics.

Of course, as far back as the famous Kagmari conference of 1957, Bhashani indicated the need for forming what he himself called "swadhin purba Bangla" (independent East Bengal), while on November 25, 1970, he unequivocally mentioned "swadhin purba Pakistan" (independent East Pakistan) in his speech. And it was he who inaugurated the moment of a democratic movement in Pakistan by first confronting and opposing the Muslim League. And it was he who also initiated the anti-imperial movement—including the movement against US imperialism—in Pakistan. And when Bangladesh emerged as an independent nation-state, Bhashani quickly realised that power was just transferred from one ruling class to another, and that the anti-people system and state remained intact.

But what, then, is the significance of Bhashani today? True, Bhashani moved from party to party. He was in the Muslim League; then he founded the Awami Muslim League; then he turned it into the Awami League; then he left it to found the National Awami Party (NAP), yet leaving it later. Why? Because none of those parties could keep pace with Bhashani's revolutionary politics that remained organically rooted in the struggles of the poor peasants and the oppressed. He enacted and embodied an unprecedented dialectic between class-line organising and mass-line organising in the interest of nothing short of total emancipation. His was a version of socialism creatively and radically indigenised: he certainly longed for an exploitation-free system and society that are impossible under capitalism and imperialism, and our national ruling classes, and he exemplarily internalised the values and messages of socialism such that he was able to turn them into active, material, and "national-popular" (to use Gramsci's term) forces, without falling into the trap of a theory-fetishising intellectualism, and realising well before anyone else during his times that culture is political, and that politics itself has its cultural aspect. For Bhashani, that cultural aspect of politics resided in the ways in which he could not only use and energise a language immediately accessible to the masses, but could also turn that language into a vehicle of what he himself and his people called praner dabi.

Indeed, to reload and reinvent Bhashani today is to inaugurate a new emancipatory, revolutionary politics in Bangladesh.

Dr Azfar Hussain is interim director of the graduate programme in social innovation and associate professor of integrative, religious, and cultural studies at Grand Valley State University in Michigan, US. He is also the vice-president of the US-based Global Center for Advanced Studies (GCAS).​

 

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Maulana Bhashani and the transition to secular politics in East Bengal

On March 10, 1947, a day of non-cooperation was observed in the colonial province of Assam.

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Maulana Bhashani and the transition to secular politics in East Bengal

Bangabandhu meets Maulana Bhashani at PG Hospital on February 10, 1972.

On March 10, 1947, a day of non-cooperation was observed in the colonial province of Assam. That morning, Maulana Bhashani succeeded in evading the British intelligence services who had issued instructions to arrest him. He crossed the Brahmaputra river in a nauka, (a small boat), then travelled onwards by land in a bullock cart, eventually reaching the town hall of Tejpur. Here, thousands of peasants had gathered for a public meeting calling for the formation of a separate state of 'Pakistan', comprising Bengal and Assam. Though the day of action was sponsored by the Muslim League, claiming to represent exclusively Muslim interests, Bhashani's speech was free of the communal rhetoric to which other Muslim League leaders were prone. He insisted that unity between Hindus and Muslims be maintained; his movement was directed against 'British imperialism' – not against any religious community.

Though Bhashani originally hailed from Sirajganj in East Bengal, (now Bangladesh), he derives his appellation 'Bhashani' from Char Bhashan, a low lying area of Assam. It was here, in the late 1920s, that Bhashani built his own hut, after having been forced by the British colonial authorities to seek refuge beyond the borders of Bengal. Before this shift, the fiery theologian had started distinguishing himself as an opponent of the feudal zamindari system which formed the backbone of Britain's rule over Bengal.

1920s Bengal saw the emergence of a movement for tenants' rights protesting unjust impositions by absentee landlords. It was actively supported by rural intellectuals, including lawyers and Islamic preachers. Maulana Abdul Hamid Khan, later to be known as 'Bhashani', was a key organiser of this movement.

In Assam, the Maulana emerged as an effective and popular peasant leader, ready to champion the cause of the downtrodden. Perhaps paradoxically, he also emerged as a widely respected leader of the Muslim League and in 1944 he was elected the party's President. The mass appeal which Bhashani developed via his support for immigrant peasants is illustrated by a short account of a Shammelan (conference) held in Mangaldoi, in 1946. The event is vividly described by the journalist-writer Abul Kalam Samsuddin, who had been invited to chair it. Arriving at the conference ground, Bhashani was greeted by a large crowd of peasants, raising their sticks above their heads. 'There must', Samsuddin writes, 'have been at least two lakh, (200,000) participants!' In a two-hour long speech to the conference, Bhashani criticised the British, but also singled out the police for atrocities committed against Bengali immigrants. Even his own Muslim League colleagues came in for criticism; Bashani exhorted them to work harder for the cause.

Just months before Mangaldoi, in April 1946, the Muslim League had won all but three seats in elections to Assam's Legislative Assembly. This resounding victory, according to the biographer Syed Abul Maksud, should 'almost entirely' be credited to Bhashani. Yet, Bhashani was no conventional Muslim League politician. In 1944, at the very meeting where he was elected party President, Bhashani appealed to the League's General Secretary, Sadullah, not to act as a 'postbox' for the British authorities. He was later to recall that, at a certain point during his stay in Assam, he had actually allied with the Congress party so as to press the Muslim League into action! Bhashani consistently used his standing as a religious leader and politician to advance the cause of the peasantry and on the eve of Partition, we find Bhashani combining the espousal of migrant peasants' interests, with a principled opposition against communal hatred, and advocating the formation of a greater Bengal state.

Bhashani as religious leader

Writings eulogising Maulana Bhashani tend to focus on his politics, and the fact that he played a central role in the political evolution of (East) Bengal. This is a rather myopic view, for Bhashani's politics cannot be understood without also taking into account the fact that he was a religious preacher with a huge following. Indeed, in Assam, Maulana Bhashani was widely regarded as a pir, a saint-like figure, commanding a large number of disciples who accepted his religious teachings, who were willing to support his politics, in particular his opposition to British colonialism.

Between 1907 and 1909, Bhashani attended the famous Islamic University of Deoband, where he received theological training. Deoband was widely regarded as a centre with progressive leanings. Several Sufi orders have influenced Deoband's teachings. Its theologians are reputed to have shared an 'anti-imperialist'orientation, and to have actively propagated the need to end Britain's domination over the subcontinent.

There are clues to which current within Islam Bhashani ultimately chose to embrace in his essay on the policy of 'Rabubiyat', written in 1974, at the twilight of his political life. This essay indicates that, from 1946 onwards, the Rabubiyat remained his guiding ideology. The Rabubiyat preaches the undivided equality of all people, whatever their caste, nationality or religion. What makes Rabubiyat distinct is that it advocates the abolition of private ownership on the basis of faith. Bhashani states: 'Man is only a custodian, whereas Allah holds ownership over all properties that exist. Thus, the state should abolish all private ownership, and should distribute things in equal proportions, on the basis of need'.

This statement reveals just how intertwined politics and religion were in Bhashani's vision and life. Indeed, for him the message of Islam was so much a vision on how society should be structured economically, that he used every occasion to impress on his followers the need to engage in struggles for socio-economic change. Bhashani preached that the peasants needed to get organised.

Painting by Zainul Abedin, January, 1971.

Transition to secular politics

After Partition, Bhashani returned to East Bengal (East Pakistan). Here, he led a mass campaign in the 1950s in favour of regional autonomy and Bengali self-determination. This campaign was to play a key role in the Maulana's journey towards the secularisation of politics, for the momentum which the movement for autonomy gained decisively demonstrated that the hold of the Muslim League and of Pakistan's rulers over the minds of the population in East Bengal was weakening, and that secularisation was truly possible.

Bhashani had already protested in public against Pakistan's economic exploitation of East Bengal in the late 1940s. Furthermore, he had also ensured that the demand stating that self-rule (swayatshashan) be granted to the province was included in the programme of the the (Muslim) Awami League, a new party formed as breakaway of the Muslim League in 1949. In the campaign for the 1954 elections he turned the demand for autonomy into the public's 'heartfelt issue' (praner dabi), showing that electoral campaigning can contribute significantly towards a society's politicisation.

After the party coalition he led had gained a convincing victory, he steadfastly continued building public opinion in support of self-determination, calling on students and other sections of the public to wear black badges on a province-wide day of resistance, and leading numerous rural demonstrations to vent the public's discontent.

The 1957 Cultural Conference at Kagmari formed the culminating point of Bhashani's campaign in favour of regional autonomy, and is considered to be a milestone in Bangladesh's history. Bhashani, as the League's President, called for a two day Council session of the party in Kagmari, Tangail, to be followed by a three day Cultural Conference. Bhashani used Kagmari to re-affirm the party's 'anti-imperialist' stance. In his conference speech, Bhashani threatened – prophetically – that if East Bengal were not granted autonomy, the people would ultimately say 'Assalamu Alaikum' (goodbye) to Pakistan.

Even today there is a tendency amongst a section of Bangladeshi politicians, to obfuscate history and downgrade Bhashani's achievements. It is critically important to underline how Bhashani's campaign for regional autonomy, which reached its peak at the Kagmari Conference, both created the environment for the secularisation of politics, and formed the precursor to the 1971 war for the independence of Bangladesh.

Yet what nasty opposition the aged preacher-politician had to face! In the wake of the Kagmari Conference, conservative pirs and maulanas publicly vilified Bhashani, arguing that he was trying to disrupt Pakistan's territorial integrity. Yet, despite all this, the history of East Bengal's subsequent evolution attests that Maulana Bhashani was a political pioneer.

Bhashani's struggle for secularisation of East Bengal's politics started well before the Kagmari Conference took place. Thus, at a Council session of the Muslim Awami League in 1955, he proposed that the word 'Muslim' be dropped from the party's name. And in his welcoming speech to the Kagmari Conference, he pushed aside Jinnah's 'two nations' theory, insisting that, while it was a country with a Muslim majority, Pakistan was 'for Hindus, Buddhists, Christians, adivasis and other small nationalities alike'. Bhashani stated that the communal problem was the 'very biggest problem of the people of India and Pakistan'. He warned that if this problem was not resolved, the people of the two countries can never live in peace, and 'all efforts at development' will be utterly wasted.

The details registered above regarding East Bengal's political evolution during the 1950s, reveal Bhashani's key role in steering the transformation of East Bengal's politics. Indeed, history attests that the 1950s saw a dramatic transition from the Muslim League with its communal grip over East Bengal's politics, towards the secularisation of the region's politics.

Maulana Bhashani did not just contribute to, but played the very determining role in achieving this historical transition. Via his leadership in the formation of East Bengal's (Muslim) Awami League, via the consultations he held on abolishing the party's communal bias, and via his speeches on the problematic relations between the Subcontinent's main religions, Bhashani helped lay the foundations for the subsequent formation of Bangladesh as a secular state.

Bhashani's class politics:

Having highlighted Bhashani's intense efforts to strengthen religious tolerance in East Bengal in the 1950s, it is now necessary to return to discuss the Maulana's class politics. Here it should be stressed that, during the given historical period, Bhashani did not just stick to the policy he had pursued before, i.e. of championing peasant demands, but took it to a new stage. He invariably took a stance in favour of the demands put forward by various sections of the labouring population, such as industrial workers, fisher folk and peasants producing Bengal's 'golden' fibre, jute. Moreover, Bhashani did not just use his leverage as a public opinion builder to promote these causes, he also took a personal interest in the self-organisation of each labouring class or section. The enhancement of class struggle was central to the methodology and strategy he used to defend religious tolerance.

Soon after his return to East Bengal from Assam, in the late 1940s, Bhashani agreed to champion the cause of waged workers employed in modern enterprises. Newspapers reports published in 1949/1950 record the sorrowful plight of workers recruited to labour for the province's railways. Many lacked proper housing, and job security did not exist. Against this background, a union of railway workers was formed in 1949, and Bhashani was elected to be its President. In this capacity he is reported to have repeatedly spoken at gatherings of the union's leading members, and he also participated in negotiations which the union held with the railway authorities. Four years later, the Maulana was again called upon to be president of another trade union. This time it was the union of workers employed in Adamjee Jute Mills, the largest industrial complex in East Bengal at that time.

One personal initiative which the Maulana undertook was regarding the formation of East Bengal's union of fisher folk. This initiative dates from 1958 and was launched immediately after Bhashani had parted ways with the Awami League, and had formed his own Leftist party, the NAP. (National Awami Party). NAP's programmatic documents expressed unequivocally Bhashani's combined orientation, on class struggle from below and on religious tolerance. The document also referred to the need for 'land reform'. In 1958, he launched a month-long drive to help prepare for the holding of a conference of fisher folk. Over a hundred delegates are reported to have gathered for this event, termed 'singular' in the history of Bengal.

The Shammelan adopted a 12-point charter of demands, with strikingly concrete propositions, including: that import licenses for fishing gear be offered to professional fishermen, that floating hospitals be set up in fishing zones, and that anyone owning a net should be granted rights over water bodies. Again, not long before he had started his drive in support of fisher folk, in January 1958, the Maulana had already taken the initiative towards the formation of a peasant association, the East Pakistan 'Krishok Samity'. Soon after, however, the process of organising in the rural areas was disrupted, when the military took over state power and imposed Martial Law.

It was only in 1964 that organising could be re-intensified. Clearly, the aged Bhashani in the Pakistan period made sustained efforts to promote the formation of union-type organisations, both in villages and towns of East Bengal. By the end of the 1960s, these efforts bore fruit and in a very explosive manner. Unfortunately, in this brief essay, there is no scope to give a detailed description of Bhashani's role in the 1968/69 uprising against military dictatorship. It should be noted, however, that he personally launched an uprising in East Bengal, via a general strike held in Dhaka on December 7, 1968, and that he personally helped shape other tactics employed by the rising's participants. In the aftermath of Ayub Khan's fall, Bhashani's leadership in the uprising drew much international attention.

In the late 1940s, just after Partition, the sphere of politics in the province had largely been communalised. By the late 1960s, through the intense and sustained efforts which the Maulana and other politicians opposed to intolerance had made, the impact of communal parties in East Bengal had dramatically declined. The change in public discourse was very visible in the uprising against Ayub Khan's dictatorship. The very success of this uprising indicates that the state could no longer exploit religion to manipulate the sentiments of East Bengal's population. Politics had largely been secularised.

Conclusion

Bhashani's efforts should be assessed within a broader, longer- term perspective on religious tolerance and the history of Bangladesh. Here two points may be re-visited: First, Bhashani did not try to position himself beyond the parameters of a single religion. Bhashani's way of identifying with Islam, it may be argued, limited his scope for incorporating syncretic elements derived from other faiths into his own world view. While he surely displayed an affinity with Bengal's syncretic tradition, his approach was different from, for instance, the poet-writer Nazrul Islam, who used an imagery derived from both Hinduism and Islam. Nevertheless, Bhashani's championing of religious tolerance from within the framework of Islam has its own, positive, importance for the contemporary debate on religious tolerance. For at a time when right-wing, Western politicians are trying to make their public believe that there is an irreconcilable conflict between the values of religious tolerance and the nature of Islam, the example of Maulana Bhashani reveals, with full force, that the opposite is the case.

Peter Custers (1949-2015) was a Dutch journalist and researcher who worked extensively on South Asia, particularly Bangladesh.

This is a summary of an article published in the The Indian Economic and Social History Review (IESHR) April-June 2010 issue, Vol.XLVII no.2, p.231: Peter Custers, 'Maulana Bhashani and the Transition to Secular Politics in East Bengal'.​

 

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Maulana Bhashani: The Lessons of Freedom

I shall begin with a story, to which I will return again. In 2013, on the occasion of the 37th death anniversary of Maulana Bhashani, I

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Maulana Bhashani: The Lessons of Freedom

I shall begin with a story, to which I will return again. In 2013, on the occasion of the 37th death anniversary of Maulana Bhashani, I met the vivacious and spirited 84-year old Burhan Uddin in Tangail (passed away in 2014). Bhashani's murid of 50 years and a peasant for far longer, his dress of straw cap, white punjabi, lungi and a wispy bead mimicked that of his Pir or, in his own words, the 'maha nayak' (great leader),'maha bidrohi' (great leader) and the 'maha pralaykari'(one who causes complete dissolution of the universe). In excited tones, he proceeded to me at length stories about Bhashani, much of it would have many squirming in discomfort, especially his wonderful and fantastical imageries of Bhashani flying over trees on his boat protected by an ambush of tigers and of the thwack of his lathi reverberating across the entire subcontinent. However, there was one story in particular that struck me the most. On the 21st night of Ramadhan 2012, Maulana Bhashani visited Burhan Uddin and told him the 'villain' American imperialism would soon be defeated, and to carry out a shongram, modern weaponry were no longer effective. The next andolan, Bhashani informed him would be on electricity.

On November 17 2015, the 39th death anniversary of Maulana Bhashani passed. The commemoration and tributes have not quite matched the larger-than-life personality that Maulana Bhashani was in the history of not only Bangladesh, but also the subcontinent and beyond. And, perhaps, this is not so bad. Perhaps, it is a more fitting tribute to be remembered in smaller, private and fragmented gatherings. There's something a lot more honest about it, given that it is often the less-than-salubrious leaders that get the grander commemorations. Their history, I support, just needs to be whitewashed that little bit more. Nonetheless, there is something a lot more dangerous here in the fading away of our collective memories of Bhashani.

To quote Walter Benjamin and, hopefully, in a not-too-random way: "what has been forgotten.... is never something purely individual." My academic research on Bhashani over the last five years stands as a testament to that. To forget Bhashani is to forget the histories of poor and landless peasants, sharecroppers, char-dwellers, and workers; it is to forget the rich and dynamic contributions of the secular and of the religious; our wider geographies, fraternities and networks; the progressive, radical and defiant voices that once were; and the possibilities and futures that people fought for until bodies were fatigued, battered, bloodied or just ceased to be. Our humanity, our redemption and our liberation must lie in the recovery of all our histories even the most obscure, reviled and rejected elements of it.

Saiq'a Chowdhury

The intention of the article is not to offer a panegyric, faint praise, prescription or timelines, all of which have been done elsewhere by others, but something different. Let us return back to Burhan Uddin. To others, his stories might have appeared as the byproduct of a semi-literate, irrational or senile mind. Burhan Uddin's ability to think and feel his way and emotions his way through complex issues of injustice, power, resistance, and humanity using the complex figure of Maulana Bhashani, rather, spoke to me of the product of a powerful pedagogy: a pedagogy of emancipation. I offer then an outline of the pedagogy, or, rather, the lessons of freedom that can be found in Bhashani's politics. This is an incomplete pedagogy because it comes from the fragments of speeches, practices and relationships that I have been able to excavate. Bhashani, unlike many of his contemporaries in South Asia, has left us with few written footprints of his own ideas, thoughts or philosophy.

So, what are the lessons of freedom then? First is the non-deferential and irreverent attitude towards those in power. Bhashani remembered nowadays as the 'Red Maulana' was known by other names during his time. The choice ones being the 'Prophet of Violence', the 'Pakistani Dean of Canterbury', 'Pakistani Ayatollah Kashani', 'Bharat's Dalal' (India's Agent), 'Hanuman' and 'Kaafir'. All names given to him by the British, Americans, Pakistanis and Bengalis alike not out of admiration but contempt. A consequence of Bhashani's caustic, abrasive and coarse tongue, which spared no one, especially those in power, friends and foes alike. In September 1956, the Awami League came into power at the centre and at the provincial level – the only time in the history of Pakistan. However, the victory rally at Paltan Maidan was to be anything but that. Bhashani, flanked by his two distinctly uncomfortable chief guests on stage, the Prime Minister Suhrawardy and Chief Minister Ataur Rahman Khan, warned the crowd: "If the Awami League mandate is not fulfilled, we will throw out the Suhrawardy Ministry with our lathis." A grimacing Abu Zafar Shamsuddin in his memoirs wondered why Bhashani had not been able to say those things in less 'uncivil' and offensive manner. Bhashani's performance, however, was not for the benefit of those who sat on stage, but for those who milled below in crowds. It was a lesson in holding those in power accountable, of being critical, of speaking truth to power, and refusing subservience to it even in democratic spaces. Paulo Freire, the Brazilian educator and philosopher wrote 'the educator has the duty of not being neutral' and Bhashani was not. When confronted with excesses of power and injustices, Bhashani reminded the people that it was they who held the real 'whip' in their hands; the true sovereigns.

The second lesson is the unabashed embrace of the diversity and heterogeneity of cultures, identities, and spaces in Bengal. Bhashani's residence in a village in Tangail, outside the political capital of Dhaka; his work in North Bengal; the constant boat tours to char-dwelling communities of Assam and Bengal; and his organisation of conference for Imams alongside the Kagmari cultural festival in 1957 was not just about Bhashani being the common or simple man. It was an affirmation of non-elite lives; that these communities mattered, and that they too possessed and produced rich and complex cultures, politics, traditions and histories of dignity, justice and freedom. It is for this person that Bhashani was not too tortured by the question of whether he was a Marxist or a Maulana, or any real contradiction between making a murid signing up to a pledge to end capitalism, anti-imperialism and establish socialism and Marxists entering mosques and religious gathering to raise political funds. Bhashani showed that both traditions belonged in the soil of Bengal and could be brought into dialogue.

Third, was a lesson in what I would call a rooted humanity. In February 1957, Maulana Bhashani planned the Kagmari conference and a three-day-long cultural festival. Bhashani would go head-to-head with Suhrawardy over the latter's defence for military pacts. Where Suhrawardy made his case for being part of the military pacts in front of middle-class intelligentsia and students in Dhaka, promising the latter trips to Baghdad Pact countries, Bhashani made his case for international co-operation, friendship and solidarity to rank and file workers of the Awami League and to peasants and workers vis-à-vis the gates, songs, dance, lectures and debates at Kagmari Festival. Bhashani showed that international solidarity and humanity were not abstract or complex concepts only to be grasped by the elite but were rooted and demonstrable through local practice, customs and traditions.

The affirmation of people power, of non-elite cultures and communities, and of humanity, which is at the heart of Bhashani's pedagogy still bears relevance.In fact it is perhaps more important than ever before, for where are the lessons of freedom in Bangladeshi politics today? If you cannot find it, then perhaps we all need to start talking about Maulana Bhashani.

The writer is a Researcher at Royal Holloway, University of London.​