| 23 October 2004 | Saturday | 08 Ramazan 1425 |
Hasina advocates reforms in electoral laws
Let the peace process be low-keyed
Multi-lingual poet and author Allama Ajmal Mazari passed away at his home in Sadiqabad this week after a protracted illness. He was around 70. He leaves behind two wives, four sons and two daughters.
Born in a farmer family in Chak Charagh Shah in the Rojhan Mazari area of Rajanpur district, he was a Fazil in Oriental Studies from the Bahawalpur state-run Jamia Islamia, which later became the Islamia University.
During his studies, he was fascinated by poetry which remained his lifelong passion. He wrote poetry in Saraiki, Balochi, Sindhi, Urdu and Persian some of which was collected in his book, Zarb-i-Qalandari. His Saraiki anthologies are Jatti, Didh and Muashra.
His prose works in Urdu include Karbala Se Kot Lakhpat Tak, a tribute to executed prime minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, and Mauj-i-Darya Ka Harif, a biography of veteran politician Sardar Sherbaz Mazari. Unfortunately, he was not able to complete his autobiography Zambeel.
A practising Sufi, Allama Mazari had no appetite for material comforts, but enthusiastically participated in literary and social activities and helped found a couple of schools in the Dad Leghari area near Daharki.
Diagnosed with cancer, he asked to be taken home from hospital and spent the night before his death reciting poetry and wrote out a moving couplet by prominent Sufi muse Bakht Faqir for his son.
Hasina advocates reforms in electoral laws
Sheikh Hasina, president of the Bangladesh Awami League and leader of the opposition in parliament, is not going to retire from politics, although she had announced in 1998, first to the media, then in parliament, that she would retire on reaching 57.
Sheikh Hasina, who turned 57 on Sept 28, vowed earlier this month to sacrifice her life for the people, implying that she would continue in the profession. The AL supremo gave another important political message on Oct 10 _ the day the government of Prime Minister Khaleda Zia completed its third year in office, that the opposition was going to initiate a fresh movement to force the government into reforming the system of holding general elections under a non-party caretaker government.
Ironically enough, Sheikh Hasina had persuaded Khaleda Zia's Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) in 1996 to accept the system _ the dispensation she now blames for her party's defeat in the Oct 2001 elections.
Addressing a civic group in Dhaka on Oct 10, Ms Hasina stressed the need for reforms in the electoral system to make it flawless. Two days later, her party's central working committee resolved to work out a formula to make the caretaker administration system flawless before the next general elections _ due in 2007.
Since her defeat in the last elections, Hasina has been ascribing the defeat to the partisanship of the caretaker administration of former chief justice Latifur Rahman. She even went to the extent of accusing five of the caretaker ministers, including Justice Rahman, of being "sold out" to her opponents.
Bangladesh has so far witnessed eight parliamentary elections since Its inception in 1971. Of the eight polls, four were held under the supervision of political governments, while the four others under non-party caretaker administrations.
Curiously, in all elections held by the political governments, the incumbents won. On the other hand, the incumbent invariably lost the elections held by a non-party caretaker government.
The Awami League has already constituted a three-member committee to suggest amendments to constitutional provisions relating to caretaker governments, on the one hand, and on the other, started negotiations with other like-minded parties on the launching of a movement against the government.
Reports have it that Sheikh Hasina has already approached the European Union and the Commonwealth seeking their support on the issue. The second largest opposition party in parliament, Jatiya Party, found the League's proposal illogical.
"How are they [the Awami League] asking for an amendment to the caretaker administration system which was introduced after a combined movement of all the opposition parties, including the Awami League? commented Gen. H.M. Ershad, the Jatiya chief, last week.
True, all the opposition parties of the day _ Awami League, BNP, Jamaat-i-Islami and the Left _ forced then president General Ershad in 1990 to step down and accept fresh elections under a caretaker administration.
Later, in 1996, the opposition parties, led by Awami League, forced the government of Khaleda Zia to insert into the constitution the provisions for holding all national polls under non-party caretaker administration.
Senior leaders of the governing BNP have also rejected the League's idea. "Earlier they (League) wanted to win no matter how, and now they want to set the rules so that they may win, observed Information Minister Shamsul Islam.
"We want to turn down the [Awami League's] idea right way," said Law Minister Moudud Ahmed. "People have not given us a two-thirds majority in parliament to implement the opposition agenda." The intelligentsia is yet to come up with a definitive stance on the issue, while the multitude appear to be indifferent to the goings-on.
Let the peace process be low-keyed
The peace process between India and Pakistan should be kept low-keyed and allowed to find its own contours and colours. This is the view of Dr Maneesha Tikekar, who is head of the department of politics at the South India Education Society College, Mumbai.
Dr Tikekar, who has been to Pakistan earlier on a research project "Religious resurgence, democracy and interstate relations between India and Pakistan", was talking to Dawn on the sidelines of a recent seminar on migration to Europe from South Asia.
She has received two literary awards for her book "Kumpanapalikadala Desh Pakistan" (in Marathi) - Country Across the Fence: Pakistan. Her latest book is Across the Wagah: An Indian's sojourn in Pakistan, which is based on her experience of her stay in Pakistan in connection with her research project.
Though she recognizes that it is everybody's wish that initiatives for peace and normalization should take an early and positive shape, she feels the need for caution. This is because "Indo-Pakistan relations are accident prone. Many good things happen and suddenly there is a brake. Not only that, things start reversing again to the older mode of hostility."
This worries Dr Tikekar and she says it is important to prevent the process from slipping back. For that reason she suggests that there should not be too much euphoria.
"Why should we have too much of publicity or comment in the media? I don't mean that these things should be secretive or clandestine, but I think if they are kept low-keyed, then it is much better. I think we should be prepared to wait."
She is sceptical about the implementation aspect of the decisions taken by the leaders of the two countries. The interests and enthusiasm of political leaders are often not matched by the bureaucracy, and because implementation is slow, there's every danger in the political culture of the two countries that initiatives may peter out. So she thinks it is necessary to make bureaucracies alert to the idea of translating the decisions of political leaders into implementable policies.
Dr Tikekar has done extensive work on the South Asian diaspora in Britain, and says that generally Indians and Pakistanis can be friendly outside their countries - perhaps because they are a minority in a third country and also because of the shared experience of discrimination and marginalization and being treated as inferior.
Sometimes, but not always, she says, when you are away from the tensions of the home country, you can build bonds in a new way and develop new, independent relationships with the diaspora of a neighbouring country. But with religion becoming an important foundation of identity, these friendships can get distorted when certain events take place in the home country.
How the home country will bear upon the identity construction is something very complex, says Dr Tikekar, who noted that Indians and Pakistanis become more friendly with one another than with any other diaspora from any other country of the region.
Asked about the possibility of the Indian and Pakistani diaspora's possible influence on their country's decision-making in bilateral relations, Dr Tikekar does not think that it can play any important role.