Revisiting the Bangladesh Story

 हमने क्या खोया, हमने क्या पाया? Is it the time to revisit our success story of creating Bangladesh? 

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Our books on India's freedom struggle, particularly the one published by the National Book Trust and authored by Bipan Chandra, Amlesh Tripathi and Barun De, would argue against the two nations theory that religion could not be the basis of nationhood.

They would support this argument by quoting the example of Bangladesh, which broke out of Pakistan in spite of both being Muslim majority countries. Well, even without the formation of Bangladesh there were too many Islamic countries. So, the point could have been illustrated even without quoting the example of Bangladesh. There are things beyond the territorial boundaries of a nation state. How did the word 'Christendom' originate? It defined the entire Christian population as one brotherhood. Does the Pope not enjoy the authority over the Catholics all over the world?What was the authority of the "Khalifa"? Who would a Muslim obey if there was a conflict between the nation state and the Caliph's decree?

So, territorial boundaries apart, there have been supranational authorities based on faith. The very concept of "Ummaah", meaning the whole community of Muslims is bound together by ties of religion, is supranational.

So, do we need to revisit the outcome of the 1971 war through which we 'liberated' Bangladesh? We have been thinking all along that breaking up Pakistan was a huge achievement and that we have created a nation which will remain perennially indebted to us for its creation. But the most recent Bangladesh creation day, Vijay Divas for India, showed that the Bangladeshis are an ungrateful lot. Many videos suggested that instead of thanking India they were throwing scorn and abuses only. 

Why did we expect otherwise? A fiercely secular republic established by Kemal Pasha Ataturk was turned on its head by Reception Tyep Erdogan to become another Islamist country. So, almost certainly, a secular republic in a Muslim majority country is a utopia. Bangladesh has only reaffirmed it.

We, as a nation, have been gloating over the disintegration of Pakistan. But what is our gain from their loss? 

Nothing much, it seems. Through the Simla agreement it was agreed that India and Pakistan would "settle their differences by peaceful means through bilateral negotiations". India thought that this would make the contentious PoK issue a bilateral matter, but Pakistan has not agreed to it and has been trying to internationalise the matter from time to time. Apart from this we returned 93,000 prisoners of war without securing any releases from Pakistan. So, as it appears, instead of one hostile Islamist country on both sides, we are having two hostile Islamist countries on our two sides. And a huge number of infiltrators is a bonus.

P.S.: I request my friends not to view this post as a criticism of the then government or PM. The 1971 war is a point of general consensus among Indians.