Hindu Party in Bangladesh keen to tie up with Jamat for forthcoming election

After Bangladesh Election Commission cleared the nominations for its nine candidates for the forthcoming election in February, the President of Bangladesh Minority Janata Party (BMJP) Sukriti Mandal told ET that he will be looking for alliance with the bigger parties.

While he refrained from clearly spelling out who he shall be forming an alliance with, Mandal however made his preference clear and claimed that while Jamat-e-Islami that can actually secure the minorities in the country, Tarique Rahman led Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) is in no position to provide security to the Hindus of Bangladesh it is.

He also maintained that while BNP is unlikely to leave nine seats to him, while Jamat will leave the seats for him and assist him in the election if a coalition is formed.
Mandal’s overture comes with an interesting backdrop of Jamat trying to reinvent itself as a more inclusive entity in Bangladaesh in the aftermath of mass uprising against Sheikh Hasina led Awami League government last year that installed Muhammad Yunus taking over as the Chief Adviser. While violence against the minorities peaked in the country, Jamat and its student wing Islami Chhatra Shibir visited Hindu Temples with a promise to protect them.

De-facto, Jamaat-e-Islami Bangladesh Ameer Dr Shafiqur Rahman had Bangladesh Jamaat-e-Islami’s Ameer Dr. Shafiqur Rahman while addressing an exchange meeting with the puja committee and priests and leaders of the Hindu community last year had said, “All citizens of this country will enjoy equal rights and people of all religions will raise their voices and say that here we are neither majority nor minority, we are all equal. I want the majority and minority issues to be dropped forever.”

For the records, with its anti-liberation role during 1971 leberation war of Bangladesh, killing of minorities and collaboration with the Pakistani army, Jamat has always carried the collaborator tag in Bangladesh politics.
Speaking to ET from Dhaka over telephone, Mandal justified his choice stating that while his party essentially represents the minorities (read Hindus) in Bangladesh, Jamat is known for being Islamists. “Practically there is no difference between us, if Jamat is called communal, so are we,” Mandal said adding that his priority remains giving the Hindus in Bangladesh a proper political platform.