The Mystry Behind Hasina's Anger against Dr. Yonus
Abid Bahar
Most people wonder why Hasina as the Prime Minister of Bangladesh and before has been so vicious against a Bangladeshi who brought both the national and international fame for Bangladesh. We wonder because Dr. Yonus is not even a political rival.
To our knowledge Dr. Yonus began his career as an academician and has been in the banking business eversince. In contrast Hasina was never an academician nor a religious fundamentalist to condemn interest charged by bank; she was a housewife turned politician. But eversince Younus became famous Hasina has been vicious against Dr. Yonus. Research shows here are several underlying reasons behind Hasina's deeply rooted anger against this international figure.
Firstly, Dr Yonus's ideas of Gramin revolution germinated during the time of Bangabandhu's 1974 famine. Amarta Sen, the Nobel Prize winner from West Bengal called it the men -made famine. AL fondly calls 1972-76 period as the time of Bangabandhu's "Golden Bengal."It is even written in Bangladesh's history book manufactured by the Hasina AL.
True, Yonus's Gramin was a reaction to the human suffering during the 1974 famine when over 300,000 people perished Yonus as a professor personally witnessed the human suffering which led him to begin an experiment in a village near Chittagong University where he finally came up with the Gramin revolution. Dr. Yonus often mentions the human suffering of the time. He never intentionally puts down Bangabadu's "Sonar Bangla" period but often explains how he began his revolution. This no doubt, inadvertantly bleeds dieheart AL heart. Hasina as the Mujib daughter can not stand this revolution that mentions the 1974 famine but glorifies Bangladesh internationally.
Secondly, in anectdotal form Dr Yonus at least once referred that on March 25 Bangabandhu Mujib in stead of waiting for the Pakistani army to take him to custody (some call it his voluntary surrender) could have choosen to be with the rebels to lead the nation as a rebel leader. To Dr. Yonus Mujib's presence as a very powerful leader with the rebels could have been more helpful for the nation to be led by him at times of the nation's supreme crisis. This is in effect a direct challenge to Mujib as the father of the nation claim. True, Mujib was an absentee leader given the title "father of the nation" by the AL is now even codified in the constitution.
Thirdly, in anictdotal form somewhere Dr. Yonus acknowledged that President Zia's financial grant at the crucial time of its growth helped the Gramin to take off from its infancy to its adolescence. To the AL this a bad news for the Gramin and surely a sin committed by Yonus because to the AL hero-worshippers, Zia was a "Pakistani razakar."
The scenerio is as if when Dr. Yonus is not with the AL he must be with the enemy. So Dr. Yonus must be a confirmed razakar too. That is why the Zia phobic Hasina even as the PM found it important that Dr. Yonus must be condemned before found guilty.
Finally, the AL party originally founded by Mawlana Bhasani to fight for democracy but under Mujib's leadership has eversince turned itself into a hero-worshipping party and not long ago, Mujib followers ganged up together on a staged BBC survey to name Mujib as the greatest Bengali of all times. Dr. Yonus's international fame is a direct challenge to Mujib as the only great man. Dr. Yonus proved himself too smart. To the AL no Bengali eversince Mujib became the leader of Bangladesh should cross his fame. Dr. Yonus crosses Bangabandhu Mujib and even received a Nobel Prize. This is not tolerable, on the other hand Hasina deserves a Nobel Prize.
Dr. Yonus as a non political person this is as if when he has been trying to avoid Bangabandhu in every turn, the shadow of Bangabandhu appears before him. Perhaps this is the reason why even before he was proven to be guilty, the Dhaka University branch of Chatro League leaders demanded that Yonus's Nobel Prize should be rebuked. Perhaps in this whole range of this on going rivalary has more to do with a battle between fact and fiction or to be sure Bangabandhu's BKSAL fascism vs. free market economy.
(Abid Bahar Ph. D. is a playwright and the author of Burma's Missing Dots and Searching for Bhasani, now teaches in Canada)
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