Feature

The spirit of independence and the younger generation

Md. Anwarul Kabir

PHOTO: STAR

On special days like our Victory or Independence days, repeated lamentations on erosion of the spirit of independence since the post Mujib era, in fact, is a cliché. To the new generations, especially to many members of the post liberation generation this simplistic notion has no special appeal at all. Rather, to them the spirit of liberation signifies some nostalgic slogans of some members of the older generation. This is, no doubt, due to the utmost failure of our older generation who bore the torch of some patriotic ideologies with a view to guiding and rationalising the popular demand for independence. Perhaps, they were so overwhelmed with their success in the War of Independence that they were little concerned for transmitting those patriotic ideologies to the newer generations, who eventually have sat at the steering position in different sectors of society of the present Bangladesh. Understandably, due to this weakness of the patriotic forces of the older generation, the reactionary and defeated forces of 1971 could quite easily succeed to manipulate the mindset of the younger generation by fabricating and twisting our national history in a shrewd manner. The defeated forces knew that if the new generations, who have not witnessed the War of Independence, could be kept in the dark concerning our history of the liberation, one day they would be in a state of success. This speculation of the evil forces had been deemed to be true to the extent that even in independent Bangladesh the infamous and identified collaborators and alleged war criminals could elevate themselves to the position of ministers in independent Bangladesh!

As a nation we must be ashamed of the fact that only after a few years of independence we deviated from the very objectives of our war of liberation, which could have been a driving force for the overall development of the country. The valiant freedom fighters in 1971 sacrificed their lives not just for achieving a mere nation state. Rather they dreamt of complete emancipation of the people of their Shonar Bangla from all forms of subjugation and bondage so that they can lead a life of dignity. The Bangladesh as we are witnessing today is not in keeping with the ambition of the freedom loving people of that time. In fact, their ambition was reflected in the spirit of independence, which is depicted in the 1972 Constitution as four firm pillars, namely, nationalism, democracy, socialism and secularism. The unfortunate distortion of these four pillars has undermined the nation as a whole. Abandoning the much-hated 'two nation theory' in 1971, people of this land embraced Bengali nationalism and secularism as basic mantras for their salvation. The irony is that many post-Bangladesh leaders, some of them freedom fighters, totally failed to foresee the implication of the reinvention of the two-nation theory in behind clever dialectics. They divided the nation into pro-liberation and anti-liberation groups by giving space to communal politics in Bangladesh for their own political interest. So, instead of secularism, as a nation, after a few years of our independence, we stepped into the realm of communalism again.

Many have also claimed that in the independent Bangladesh, it was none but Bangabandhu who killed democracy and established authoritarian rule by introducing BAKSAL in 1975. Apparently this seems to be true. But this becomes half-true if we objectively analyse the rationale behind introducing BAKSAL on his part. In fact, it can be argued that democracy loving Bangabandhu was bound to embrace authoritarian rule in accordance with the demand of the time. The very objective of BAKSAL was to establish socialism in the country, which was one of the major spirits of our Liberation War. Besides, BAKSAL was formed in a democratic way through proper discussion in parliament and most of the people of the country, including leading intellectuals, journalists and other professional groups, as reported in the newspapers of that time, unanimously congratulated BAKSAL. However, right now, no conclusive remark on BAKSAL is possible as it died in its infant stage with the brutal killing of the father of the nation.

Socialism has been depicted as one of the vital driving forces in our War of Liberation. At that time, for total economic emancipation, socialism was considered the most powerful ideology. Though, in the present global context the term socialism has no appeal to many, in the context of our country this symbolises the economic emancipation of the people. We have also distorted this spirit of liberation by importing consumer driven and black money oriented economy into our country.

The post 1975 era failed to put the country on a right democratic footing. In fact, from 1975 to 1990 the country was run under either direct or quasi-military regimes. It has been historically proven that no military regime in the world works for promoting true democracy. However, post-1990 could have been a golden era for practising true democracy in the country. But due to the rising impact of communalism and terrorism, corruption-ridden leadership and intolerance between two major political parties, the country failed to avail that opportunity.

National election of this month in completely different context has brought in rays of hope among the democracy loving people of the country. However, if we want to see real progress in the country, we have to start from the premise. It is a must to instil into the mindset of the new generation the spirit of the War of Liberation. Then may be in the near future, a fresh, new leadership will arise to lead the country in a positive way.

(Md. Anwarul Kabir teaches computer science at AIUB. He can be reached at kabir@aiub.edu)