David Bergman's latest pearl of wisdom in Netra News, where he argues that both narratives about Bangladesh — the positive and the negative — are right, has provoked me to respond with a column of my own. That's a possible effort to position himself on both the North and South Poles to look the 'unbiased independent analyst' he projects himself as to conceal his true identity — a Western freebooter and an aspiring Jared Kushner in the making. Bergman may also be trying to make a tactical climbdown from his hitherto-absolutist positioning that the Sheikh Hasina regime is the worst Bangladesh has experienced and must be brought down the soonest.
But Bergman and a few others like The New York Times's Nicholas Kristof bowl a googly when they credit Bangladesh's phenomenal economic and human development to NGOs like BRAC and Grameen Bank. Their narrative falls flat on the face when development economists credit the Hasina government for Bangladesh's Golden Decade of Development. Anyone with the rudimentary idea of economics would agree that NGOs, however much they may play a supportive or catalytic role in development through microfinance or sectoral push, are incapable of huge budgetary outlays in health, education and gender development infrastructure, without which meaningful and durable advances are not possible. So the Kristofian logic that Bangladesh has achieved what it has despite poor political leadership has found no takers. And top economic-business writers like Mike Bird and Grace Li or Bangladesh editors like Mahfuz Anam have credited Hasina for instilling infectious confidence that has led to substantial growth and hope for more in future.
That confidence and single-minded zeal to develop at any cost, be it the 'burn all, destroy all' Islamist violence or endless 'regime change' conspiracies, cuts out Hasina. I covered the Bangladesh Liberation War in 1971 and have covered the country ever since. I have known Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and his daughters, as well as Indian leaders like Manmohan Singh, Pranab Mukherjee and Jyoti Basu intimately. I know the country through my blood, my roots in Barishal, and me having been grown up in distinctively East Bengali origins even after the Partition prepared me for an understanding of Bangladesh which the likes of Bergman or Kristof have been deprived of. Parachuted experts only understand a little, despite pretensions. Hasina's commitment to her country's growth, her patriotism and fearlessness to even confront her friends like India in pursuit of her national interest and her love for the poor and the vulnerable cuts her out as the South Asian leader with the best human face. It is her motherly-sisterly touch to economic growth and human development that has made Bangladesh's phenomenal economic rise so inclusive. I often hear complaints from my many 'sisters' in Bangladesh that they don't have enough 'kamer bua'(maidservants) these days. Why is that, Messrs Bergman and Kristof? It is not just for microfinance wizardry — and experts say microfinance can be quite a burden on the poor — but for the huge and focused budgetary allocations in education, health and gender empowerment and in areas like developing ICT infrastructure. Bangladesh has broken the global record for being the country with the highest distribution of textbooks that along with midday meals attract and hold poor children to school.
But for a leader, who has averted more than a dozen assassination attempts, such single-minded determination for development is exceptional and the dozens of international awards recognising her contribution to the fight against poverty to climate change is the recognition of something the likes of Bergman and Kristof are trying to deny her. I am also amazed by Bergman's latest spin that India's backing of Hasina is responsible for the huge violence during Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit to Bangladesh in March. Let me counter this off-spin with a reverse sweep. Is India expected to back any other leader and party other than Hasina and the Awami league? The answer is no. As a Bengali and Indian, I furiously protested when Atal Bihari Vajpayee's Bharatiya Janata Party government was involved in a brief honeymoon with Khaleda Zia's government in 2001-2003. I am privy to the video evidence received from an agent by Indian intelligence of Khaleda's son Tarique Rahman meeting an ISI top boss and Bombay underworld don Dawood Ibrahim not long after he visited India and was welcomed in Delhi and Mumbai (by Reliance boss). That 45-minute long video footage buried the thesis put forth by the likes for India's first National Security Adviser (NSA) Brajesh Mishra that India should not put all its eggs in one basket in Bangladesh. The truth is India has only one basket in Bangladesh — the rest are bottomless where your eggs risk falling below and crack.
I have three questions for Bergman — (a) is Hifazat-e Islam violence surrounding Modi visit a reflection of popular unrest or is it targeted, regime change-driven Islamist radical violence resembling ISIS's drive to bring down the Bashar Al Assad regime in Syria? (b) Is it not true the Hifazat has been on violent street protests to bring down Hasina for two years on issues as diverse as Mujib statues, developments in France, Indian vaccines, and that the Modi visit was just another excuse to create mayhem and chaos? (c) When the US bombs ISIS or Al Qaida bases in the Middle East or Afghanistan and cause huge collateral damage, these Western lobbyists or do-gooders don't find any human rights violations, so why do they fume and fret when the police open fire to stop rampaging Hifazatis who want to stop women education (beyond class 4) and for whom minorities have no place in a future Bangladesh? Yes, Mr Bergman, our roots in Bangladesh and our sense of Bengali pride in its achievements leads to our appreciation of Hasina's zero tolerance of terrorism. Her police did not fire on peaceful protestors as the Burmese army does in Myanmar — they fired on hardline fundamentalists who set fire to the music academy at Ustad Alauddin Khan's ancestral house in Brahmanbaria or a central public library. In pursuit of peace, Mr Bergman may argue. Some joke, I would imagine.
These fundamentalists are beyond political dialogue or reason and if force is what they use to achieve political ends, they must be met with force. Around 70 cases of infant rape, over the span of a year, in madrasas and pictures of child sexual abuse by these clergymen gives a lie to their claim to establish Islamic rule in Bangladesh. We are talking about criminals in a messianic garb. Bangladesh is a Bengali land and will stay one. It will be Sonar Bangla and not a radical Islamic state run by extremists that Hifazat or other extremists want. And India will have to keep backing those who uphold the spirit of 1971 and prioritise friendship with India. A World Bank report has said India and Bangladesh's national economic income will grow between 8 and 10 percent with greater seamless connectivity. It is a made-for-each-other syndrome despite the occasional hiccup. Here the rise of Hindutva in India does create a problem for Hasina and the Awami league but what can they do about it. They have to deal with the government in Delhi anyway. But any government in Delhi knows who is their friend in Bangladesh, regardless of all the spin by lobbyists like Bergman. And yes, regardless of the Hifazat violence, India will back Hasina and her government. It has no choice.