The reality is quite something else, which is that it is not the BKM but the Awami League which has had a climb-down in policy enunciation. Through linking up with men who plainly would like to see a religious political dispensation, if not exactly a communal polity, in place, Sheikh Hasina, Abdul Jalil, and everyone else behind the five-point deal with the Khelafat Majlish people have only stepped into the camp of the BKM people. It is not the other way round.

And if, now, the Awami League wishes to portray the memorandum of understanding with the BKM as an electoral strategy, it is making an even bigger mistake of informing the country that its fundamental concern today is about winning power. Nothing else matters.

And yet the Awami League, in all its long history, has been a much more substantive affair than attaining power. It has, in the course of modern Bengali history, been a proper vehicle for a propagation of secular democratic ideals. When it jettisoned its communal skin in the 1950s, it sent out the powerful message that it was inaugurating a fresh, new, necessarily liberal trend in the politics of Pakistan.

It was such ideals that eventually carried Bengalis through to a spirited movement for autonomy, and then to political and geographical sovereignty as a nation. It is this heritage of the Awami League which has now been put at risk through that notorious deal with the Khelafat Majlish.

There are some terribly bad holes in the Awami League argument that the right of "fatwa," which it has so cheerfully handed over to the Khelafat Majlish, will be exercised by "alems," clerics possessed of profound religious knowledge. The holes are too big not to be noticed.

In the first place, a "fatwa," or religious decree, in these days of modern political sensibilities runs counter to the principle of law, to due process of law. There is the very real probability of the "fatwa," if the fourteen-party alliance wins the election, taking the place of the universally accepted pattern of rule of law, particularly in the villages, and thereby ensuring the rise of a parallel system of justice in the land.

We in Bangladesh certainly do not have tribal laws in operation, behaviour that is preponderant in large areas of Pakistan. But when you decide that clerics can dispense "fatwa" you are telling the country, in so many words, that the possibility of the law and human rights being undermined in the villages and small towns of Bangladesh is about to become pretty real.

In the second place, despite everything that the Awami League might say about the "fatwa" being decided upon and imposed by clerics conversant with Islamic law, the truth is somewhat a little uglier than that: imposing religious edicts on a populace in a modern political dispensation is a clear attempt at a revival of medievalism. It is a point that the Awami League seem not to have remembered.

The result is all the fear, all those worries which we now have before us. There are all the women who, in the rural regions, have, of late, made contributions to their family's economic welfare through employment with, or sponsorship of, non-governmental organizations. Once the "fatwa" becomes an officially sanctioned instrument of operation, it is these women, their futures, that will come under a huge, increasingly darker shadow.

And that is not all. The Awami League's deal with the Khelafat Majlish comes underpinned by the pledge not to allow any criticism of, or derogatory remarks about, the Prophet of Islam. Any individual who understands history, or has climbed the peaks of urbanity, will do nothing that can humiliate a religion or undermine a great religious icon.

But in a society where the level of ignorance remains abysmally high, and where the tendency to intimidate in the name of religion is yet a potent factor of life, the "fatwa" can and will be used to harass such beleaguered communities as the badly mauled Ahmadiyyas. How much security will an Awami League-led government be ready and equipped to provide to such victims of the "fatwa" peddlers?

The deal with the Khelafat Majlish punches a lot of holes in the Awami League's politics of secularism. If in the early 1990s when the party thought it politically expedient to include an Islamic motif on its posters, nestling as it did between the very relevant slogans of Joi Bangla and Joi Bangabandhu, in this season of political chaos it has taken expediency to ridiculous heights. Of course one understands the spirit behind such statements as no law being made in clear contravention of Islamic ideals. But where does that place the other religious communities inhabiting the country?

The Awami League needs to step back a little, observe conditions as they are and consider the damage it has done to itself, and the distress it has caused to millions of Bengalis. The Awami League is nothing if it comes denuded of its idealism. If the country sees nothing unnatural about the BNP tying the knot with the Jamaat-e-Islami (for the two have been soul-mates over a long stretch of time), it is quite an acceptable proposition for it.

But when the Awami League strikes a deal with elements which consider liberal thought a sign of godlessness, look upon the war of liberation as an act of heresy and think nothing of women's rights, it simply gets the line between morality and political opportunism blurred. That is not merely a sad thing to happen. It also sends out shock-waves across a land in the historical transformation of which the party has been the leading mover and shaker. Why must the Awami League go to power in the company of men who live in caves?

The Awami League's understanding with the Khelafat Majlish is a demonstration of policy making without the accompanying factor of transparency. There has been little hint so far of a broad section of the party leadership having been involved in the "fatwa" deal, which again points to a danger: party decision-making could likely be slipping into the hands of a narrow band of politicians. That is unhealthy, particularly when you consider that the accommodation with the BKM has swiftly resulted in some significant nominations for the general elections going to individuals whose past cannot but cloud our future.

It may be that the Awami League will own up to its mistake. It may even be that it will, under pressure from its followers, repudiate the deal with the Khelafat Majlish. The damage, though, has been done. And all secular Bengalis have felt diminished by this assault on their self-esteem.

Syed Badrul Ahsan is former executive editor, Dhaka Courier.