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| Delhi closely monitors events in Bangladesh | | Dhaka won't gain from anti-India activity | | B L KAK
NEW DELHI NOV 29
India is not to blame for the choice of operations it has employed while closely monitoring the developing situation in Bangladesh. With the growth in the number and influence of the ones favouring militant Islam in Bangladesh, New Delhi has reasons to be watchful. In addition to the major political parties' confrontation, Bangladesh is also witnessing an upsurge in violence by militant Islamists.
Like Pakistan, political Islamists have become disproportionately empowered as Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) and its predecessor military rulers sought legitimacy through Islamic slogans. Islamic political parties have a legitimate political role in any predominantly Muslim country provided they operate within the framework of the country's constitution. Democrats should not allow dictatorships to legitimise themselves through irresponsible import of extreme ideology and the acceptance of radicalisation for short-term gains.
Pakistan's promotion of religious hardliners in return for aid and madrassa funding has not had positive results. The country is still reeling from the blowback of two decades of involvement with jihads in Afghanistan and Kashmir. The political leadership of Bangladesh should avoid a similar pitfall in the name of containing Indian influence.
Political polarisation is at its peak in Bangladesh ahead of the forthcoming parliamentary elections. Democracy has worked in Bangladesh, albeit in a flawed manner, since the toppling of General Ershad's military regime in 1990. Then, a popular uprising led by civilian politicians forced a uniformed coup-maker out of power. Bitterness between the country's two major political parties, the Awami League (AL) and the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) has periodically hampered effective governance over the past 16 years.
But power has alternated between the two parties through regular elections and by and large democratic freedoms have been respected. A unique constitutional arrangement requiring the creation of a neutral caretaker government to conduct elections has so far ensured that the results of elections are accepted by all concerned.
The tradition of rotation of power through elections, which has been completely missing in Pakistan's unfortunate history, is now under threat in Bangladesh. The BNP, which wielded power from 2001, is currently being accused by the Awami League of attempting to fix the forthcoming polls. The outgoing ruling party is said to have added hundreds of thousands of phantom voters to the electoral rolls.
The caretaker government formed at the end of BNP's term is not seen universally as neutral. The constitution requires the appointment of a retired chief justice as chief adviser who acts as head of government in the caretaker set-up. But Bangladesh's president, a BNP man, has appointed himself as the country's chief executive, resting on constitutional provisions allowing him to name someone else to the job if a former supreme court chief justice does not accept it. The absurdity of the president being his own chief adviser seems to have made little difference.
Given the Bengali Muslims' commitment to popular politics, Bangladesh should have been an example for Pakistan. But now there are fears that current trends in Bangladesh would lead to a gradual Pakistanisation of Bangladeshi politics.
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