Twisted Allegiance

Few nations exhibit a more perverted sense of history than Bangladesh. That a mob in Dhaka could vandalise and set ablaze the residence and memorial of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, the man who led the country to independence, defies belief. It is not merely an act of hooliganism but a grotesque betrayal of Bangladesh’s ideals that birthed the nation in 1971. That this desecration was not met with universal condemnation suggests a deeper malaise within the country’s national consciousness - one that is increasingly shaped by religious radicalism, historical revisionism and a perverse affinity for its former oppressor, Pakistan.

The protesters claimed that the house, long associated with Mujibur Rahman’s family, was allegedly a symbol of ‘authoritarianism’ and ‘fascism.’ Exiled writer Taslima Nasreen aptly observed that the last trace of Bangladesh’s founder had been burned to ashes.

The timing of the attack is telling. It occurred just a day after Sheikh Hasina, the ousted prime minister and Mujibur’s daughter, called on her party workers to protest against the interim government led by Muhammad Yunus.

This was not the first such act of historical vandalism. In August last year, during the student-led uprising that toppled Hasina’s government, the same residence was torched.

The mob’s justification for its actions, the claim that Mujibur’s house represented fascism, is laughable. Mujib was no saint and his rule was marked by misgovernance, while his attempt at a one-party state in 1975 was ill-advised. But to equate him with authoritarianism while turning a blind eye to the regimes that followed, including the military juntas of the 1980s and the creeping Islamism of recent years, is intellectually dishonest. Worse, it betrays a fundamental ignorance of history.

More disturbing is the newfound warmth between Dhaka and Islamabad. In September last year, Yunus met with Pakistan’s then-prime minister, Shahbaz Sharif, to discuss the forging of a strategic relationship between the two nations. This is the same Pakistan whose military butchered up to three million Bangladeshis, raped hundreds of thousands of women, and left behind a trail of destruction that the country is yet to recover from. That Dhaka should now seek rapprochement with its former oppressor, rather than demanding an apology and reparations, is an insult to those who fought for its freedom.

Equally shameful is Bangladesh’s ingratitude toward India. In 1971, India took in millions of refugees, armed and trained the Mukti Bahini, and waged a war that liberated Bangladesh. Without India’s intervention, the Pakistani army’s genocide would have continued unchecked. Yet today, anti-India sentiment runs deep in Bangladeshi political discourse, stoked by Islamist groups and opportunistic politicians. Dhaka’s willingness to flirt with China, despite Beijing’s historical support for Pakistan during the war, further underscores its strategic myopia.

The destruction of Mujib’s memorial signals a dangerous drift toward historical amnesia. Those who cheer the erasure of Bangladesh’s founding legacy should remember that history has a way of exacting its revenge.