It’s all about lungi

We were preoccupied with the future of our country.

The media was awash with the news of demonstrations between the fundamentalist right and the secular forces.

We were in the midst of debates between freedom of speech and the restrictions imposed.

Then of course the issue of lungi erupted. All because the newly elected board of one of the most prestigious neighbourhoods imposed a lungi ban on the rickshawallahs plying their streets. The ban was first reported on Facebook, then by a local newspaper. Afterwards, the society rescinded the ban, but it was too late. Enraged, bemused, and emboldened by the ban, a march was organized via Facebook, and before we knew it, it was showing that thousands had 'accepted' the invite.

Instead of thousands, hundreds showed up at the open field in Banani, with the goal of heading to Baridhara. It was the last day of Chaitra, and air was festive. However, the police, decked up in riot gear, was more prepared to confront the missing thousands.  Those who did show up, many decked in lungis for the first time, were prevented from leaving the field. An impromptu fashion walk of lungi clad youths ensued. Entry to Baridhara itself was somewhat more confrontational, with a few, for the grand offence of carrying lungis, were temporarily hauled off.

Yes, it was all about lungis, the harmless and comfortable single pierce tubular fabric that men for centuries have adorned both at home and outside for their daily chores. The artists Sultan and Zainal Abedin have rightfully depicted the simple garb as the adornment of the masses.

Somehow, the analogy of Marie Antoinette came into mind. The nation was up in arms over the scarcity of bread and she had famously had suggested that those starving masses should switch to cake in lieu of bread. Battered by hartals, political upheavals, general uncertainties and what not, people like these rickshawallahs and other day labourers bear the brunt of shutdowns. A majority of them do not earn enough to have any savings and they literally live from hand to mouth on the streets of Dhaka. Baridhara, being a diplomatic zone, has a plethora of moneyed individuals, who are successful entrepreneurs. I do understand that there is a question of image of the neighbourhood. It is after all, one of the very few gated communities of the country outside the armed forces, and it does have its fair share of diplomatic presence, including ironically, that of Myanmar, whose national dress happen to be a stylized version of the same lungi. However, what right do we have to tell our blue collar brothers who are out there under the open sky what to wear and what not to wear in course of their livelihood? The lure of Baridhara for rickwallahs is of course these Bideshis who are less likely to haggle and happy to hand over a few extra notes. There were also trousers provided for a price at the gates and some of them with extra cash did avail them for a few hundred that was charged to them.

Now the lungi storm has reached the courts, with a showcause notice to the society officials as to why this ban should not been deemed illegal. The ban issue, even though withdrawn, will linger somewhat longer it seems.

Couch sociologists and anthropologists termed it as a nouveau riche phenomenon. Others were somewhat less polite, terming this as an arrogant something or rather of some sort, to the point of inviting the ban connoisseurs to go back to the family albums going back a few generations, if any, and inspect what garb the men had on. However, it does reflect the fact that there is a great social divide in the making. As part of the society gets more affluent and westernized, our models to emulate are no longer from within but from abroad, the lungi-less west to be more precise. Many of us have abandoned the lungi within our domestic settings and we assume that the rest have done the same. The ban also has been attributed to the Tri-State phenomenon (i.e. the neighburhoods of Gulshan, Banani, and Baridhara), and everything outside the demarcated areas are considered beyond the pale, a large pocket westernized elitism that is becoming more visible. The lungi ban, hidden under a mountain of social changes, did provide a comic relief to quite a few and enraging the rest in equal passions.

Kaiser Haq, a noted professor of English, wrote a piece called "Ode to the Lungi' some time back. Given the current context, the piece had been way ahead of its time, with albeit a hefty dose of humour and sarcasm, as if, he had foreseen the days when this piece of fabric will be questioned. Our youth have reclaimed the gamcha as part of the attire that reflects the 'Swadeshi' spirit and patriotism. The visual clues of it resurgence are everywhere. Yet the ban on the other garb that has complimented the gamcha still happened.  Let the Lungi be…

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MK Aaref is an architect, and the CEO of Edward M. Kennedy Center Dhaka.