From: kazi@hercules.cis.udel.edu (Zunaid Kazi)
Subject: Re: Ganga Water sharing
Keywords: Farakka Barrage
Organization: University of Delaware, Newark
Date: Sat, 26 Dec 1992 22:13:38 GMT

In article <1hif0kINN542@aludra.usc.edu> banerjee@aludra.usc.edu (Samit Banerjee) writes:
>
>Yes and the reason was that for the only time in your history you had a 
>secular and democratically elected Government. Following Mujib's death
>and the series of coups that lead to Zia-ur-Rahaman's accession, BD became
>a fundamentalist and military dictatorship. History tells us that good
>relations between theocratic states and democracies are rare, if at all 
>possible. 

Your last statement is correct, but I would like to take up cudgels
(verbal of course :-)) re the statement about Bangladesh being a
fundamentalist and military dictatorship.

1] During Ershad's regime [ March '82 - Dec '90] Bangladesh was for 
   all practical purposes a dictatorship. Even though Ershad attempted 
   to dimilitarize his rule by holding pseudo-elections [boycotted by 
   almost all major parties] his rule was essentially despotic and 
   undemocratic. 

   Sattar's government prior to Ershad's coup can in no way be termed
   as a military dictatorship. The presidential elections that were
   held following Zia's elections were participated by all major
   political parties and Sattar's election mirrored the views of
   the electorate. But, as is usual in subcontinental elections,
   charges of rigging and mal-practice were rife; However, Sattar's
   election was due to the massive sympathy vote that BNP was
   heir to.

   The parliamentary elections held, following Ershad's ouster, under
   the aegis of a non-partisan interim government were universially
   acknowledged to be the freest elctions in recent memory. Bangladesh
   is now entirely a democratic country with a freely elected 
   government.

2] Neither can Bangladesh be called a theocratic state. True, Islam
   has been made the State religion, as opposed to declaring Bangladesh
   an Islamic state. This would be equivalent to the UK having 
   Anglicanism as the state religion. Though the secularity of
   the constitution has been amended in this way, in all other
   respects the Bangladesh is democratic and secular. The laws
   of the land derive from secular laws [derived from the British
   common law] and not the Sharia.
  
Hence your adjectives of Bangladesh being a fundamentalist and military
dictatorship is either outdated or inappropriate.     

>And I am not simply saying this because BD is a Islamic country. You only 
>have to look at Nepal which was ruled by a monarchy until recently to 
>realise the truth. Now that Nepal is a democracy again, relations with 
>India have improved by leaps and bounds. And Nepal is the world's only 
>Hindu country. 

Well, since Bangladesh is a democratic country we should see an improvement
in Indo-Bangla ties, shouldn't we? In fact the warmest relationship
between Bangladesh and India [post Mujib - Indira honeymoon] was during
the Janata government under Morarji Desai. Zia and Desai signed an
interim water sharing agreement that was beneficial and fair to both.
After Indira's re-election and the resultant big-brotherly attitude
that the Nehru progenies were inclined to harbour with their little 
neighbours relationship between the two countries again took a more
frosty turn. 

In essence, it takes two to tango.

>Samit Banerjee				|			

- Zunaid Kazi
  kazi@cis.udel.edu

Newsgroups: soc.culture.bangladesh