THE instant response of most to the question in the title would be, ‘We had no choice but to fight for our survival and liberate our country from the Pakistani military occupation.’ It’s correct but incomplete because people do not plunge into a war on a whim unless it was brewing over quite some time. By sheer determination we instinctively resisted the armed assault instantly, and by doing so that very moment became a momentous occasion. A new nation-state was born. But we still had to endure nine months of war, butchery, destruction, death and migration before celebrating the hard-earned independence.
Political turmoil had flared up when the first parliament session was cancelled on March 3, 1971. From then onwards till that fateful night of March 25, the tempo was building across the country with a gut feeling that perhaps a bitter conflict was looming somewhere on the horizon. What type or when it may strike wasn’t clear till the bitter end. Reasons were plenty. But the most pertinent one was probably that the Bengali leadership wasn’t sure what exactly it wanted. Six points within Pakistan’s state structure, or independence from Pakistan? The junta wouldn’t agree to either. In such an eventuality, what would be the course of action? The leadership was confused, to say the least. Consequently, we stumbled into the war, psychologically prepared but materially unprepared.
We had strong political and moral ground to stand on and defend our country and our legitimate rights. We had a solid electoral victory, enough to form a national government by ourselves. The Pakistani junta schemed to deprive us of that victory. And that’s why, when after that black night we picked up arms to resist the military occupation, we succeeded in drawing a wide range of sympathy and support from across the world but mainly India. The quick formation of a provisional government in exile was very helpful. This enabled us to project a rock-solid unity with the local collaborators in the face of insurmountable odds, but we weren’t very sure about the shape and structure of the future state. Perhaps that’s the nature of national liberation movements, or maybe we were a bit naïve in expecting political freedom and parliamentary democracy to be enough to ensure stability and equality. While these are essential elements in a nation’s life, to move forward there is one more key element that’s required. Economic deprivation can get people agitated, but to hold them together needs a firm sense of belonging, an ideology, and nationhood.
Did we have any? Undoubtedly the Awami League, the party that led the six-point protests and the liberation war, did aspire to Bengali nationalism. All during the sixties, especially late in the decade, the AL, along with Moulana Bhasani, had mobilised and inspired people on the basis of it. They argued that because of ethnic Bengali identity, East Pakistanis got deprived economically. Six points was the answer. But it was impossible within the Pakistan state structure. So, how to achieve it? Here is where things began to get murky. Creating a new state was the only answer, but it was not spelt out in six points. What to do? Pakistan was created on the basis of religion, but a Bengali nation would be ethnicity-based. Two, of course, were and still are at odds. Without resolving this conflict, Bangladesh plunged into a national liberation war. No matter what, this inner friction won’t go away without much-needed political resolution; till then, it will keep on doggedly pursuing us frequently. In the past half a century and more, we have experienced several political turmoils over key issues of power relations, but the underlying cause of friction over our nationality was never resolved.
What makes a nation?
SEEKING a singular definition may be futile. Various schools of political science/sociology offer contradictory definitions. The United Nations recognises more than two hundred nations and nation states, but the distinction between nations and states remains ambiguous. Ethnic nations had appeared in different regions from antiquity. Perhaps their origin was rooted in tribes. Multiple tribes gradually evolved as nations, and yet many didn’t or couldn’t. But the attempt to explain it enters a minefield when defining a nation as a political entity vis-à-vis power relations, i.e., the state. Yes, Benedict Anderson’s definition of nation as an ‘imagined community’ sparked excited debate across multiple disciplines in recent times, but he failed to notice that all organised societies similar to Cartesian doubt ‘I think, therefore I am’ is the result of collective imagination. However, he accepted Hugh Seton-Watson’s conclusion, ‘Although no scientific definition of the nation can be devised, yet the phenomenon exists.’ It’s something like literature, a creative phenomenon that rationalises a particular time, space and emotion of human existence that science cannot explain.
A nation may have other elements in its body politic, but without a shared ethnicity, it is incomplete. Just as family is the basic unit of society, ethnicity is that of nationality. A nation can be an artificial construct like so many postcolonial ones, but an ethnic people/society embodies organic growth; as a real entity, it evolves over a long period of time; it cannot be imagined, granted or imposed. It may have other elements, but a shared ethnicity, space, dialect, and culture make them distinct. With these traits, an ethnic people at some point in its evolution may grow into a nation. And with the twists and turns of history, it may also grow into a politically defined nation if its cultural and political aspirations match its material conditions. However, this process may not automatically lead to statehood; a host of other conditions need to be present. Conditions that enabled the rise of nations in Europe may or may not be present on other continents. However, it is essential to have a few common features. Without it, there is no universality in its appeal.
By the early second millennia, Europe was largely governed by multiple feudal monarchies. In different regions of Europe, since most people were illiterate, their means of communication were local vernaculars as opposed to the official Latin. It was the language of the nobility and the Church, and both practised oppressive serfdoms. Consequently, ordinary people slowly got alienated from both. They formed their own communities and, in time, grew into ethnic people. Over the next many centuries they stirred and surged and finally, in the wake of the famous Enlightenment movement, rebelled against their rulers. They seized power and took fate into their own hands and, in the process, grew into political nations. They got rid of feudal practices and decided societies will be governed by man-made laws instead of divine ones. This was the key element marking the dawn of modernity, i.e., liberation from the fetters of mediaeval religiosity. Europe underwent a societal transformation from a faith-based feudal order to a linguist and ethnicity-based capitalist one. The next two centuries saw the idea of modernity catch up with the rest of the world, attended by science, technology and the industrial revolution followed by the colonial project.
But when the colonies claimed nationhood, they neither had similar social or historical nor material conditions that were present in Europe. In hindsight it’s safe to say aspiration may have been present, but the other conditions were not. Consequently, much of the post-colonial world is struggling to define nation, nationality or nationhood’ in the context of socio-economic backwardness and constant political instability coupled with acute poverty and so many other shortcomings. This was the general background when Bangladesh’s liberation war burst open onto the world stage. It would affect the entire region.
Evolution of Bengali nation
FROM the 10th-11th centuries onwards, multiple ethnic nations were born in the subcontinent, not by design but by the natural process of integration and regional pulls in a huge landmass. Few of these nations were Bengali, Tamil, Gujarati, Marathi, Ahomi and so on. Bengal back then was ruled by a local Buddhist monarchy, the Palas. Common folks spoke old Bangla, derived from Prakrit, Pali, Magadhi, and Sanskrit. This can be traced from a Buddhist text (Chorjapod) of the 10th century. From then on, the more the societies integrated, the more the language got refined, a process that endured over many centuries. Local rulers were keen to help Bengali because of rivalry with the rulers in Delhi. By the 15th-16th centuries, a Bengali ethnic identity had become clearly visible. But it was only from the mid-19th century that a refined Bangla language helped the Bengalis to consolidate and develop national aspirations.
By the early 20th century, through the agitation against the Bengal partition plan, the Bengalis aspired to be a political nation. But within a few years, for two key reasons, it petered out. First, Bengal itself failed to bridge the communal rift within, and second, the rising Indian national ambition with a veiled trace of Brahminic primacy became more alluring. Unlike the rest of India, the Hindu-Muslim communities in Bengal were nearly equal in size but quite unequal in all other respects, such as wealth, education and social status. This made Bengali national unity unmanageable to attain. The lower-caste Bengali Hindus were not part of the growing Bengali nation either. Much deeper issues were at stake; to be addressed later.
Bengali Hindus were at least 2/3 generations ahead in these areas. Bengali Muslims felt left out and were unwilling to be part of a nation where the Bengali Hindus would continue to be the dominant partner. They started nursing a Muslim identity while holding Bengali ethnicity. When by 1946 the communal tension reached a peak, they voted nearly en bloc for the Muslim League in the provincial assembly election that eventually paved the way for creating Pakistan. At that point Bengali Muslims approved both these identities as pillars of their nationhood, and by doing so, they endorsed the two-nation theory. But all was not well on the eastern front. They soon realised that Pakistani rulers wanted to erase the very Bengali identity from the Muslims of East Pakistan. Obviously the latter resisted, and over the next two decades and more, through a series of political and cultural movements, the Bengalis claimed equity that eventually led to seeking a separate state based on its ethnic identity in 71. The liberation war was an enormous accomplishment. We took a quantum leap and became a modern nation-state. But did we undergo a social-economic transformation?
At least we imagined we did. However, events proved otherwise. Having created a state, we were confused as to what would be our national identity: Muslims, Bengalis, or Muslim Bengalis? It seems while we had solid political rationale for waging the liberation war, our ideological foundation was very weak or confusing. Once the Pakistanis imposed the war, we had no choice but to fight back while hoping to work out ideological/philosophical bases or issues later. A societal transformation remained and still remains a far cry.
To be continued.
Ali Ahmed Ziauddin is a researcher and activist.
