Sun 17 Aug 2008
The first general election in what is now Bangladesh took place in 1937. People, well about 10 per cent of adult population, voted for the legislative assembly of the British Indian province of Bengal. Elections were held under communal electorates. Indian National Congress became the largest party, but it fell well short of a majority. More importantly, it performed very poorly among the Muslim majority of the province. Muslim seats in the assembly were divided between AK Fazlul Huq’s Krishak Praja Party (KPP), HS Suhrawardy’s Muslim League, and independents, with KPP having the most seats.
KPP and Congress were both committed to secularism (by which they both meant pluralism), and Mr Huq expressed an interest in forming a coalition government with Congress. Provincial leaders of Congress were keen on the idea, but it was vetoed by their all-Indian leadership. Huq formed a coalition with the League. Within three years, he would be moving the Lahore Resolution. Within a decade, Bengal would be partitioned. What if Congress had taken up Huq’s offer?
August 27th, 2008 at 3:00 pm
This was a fantastic article prompting a lot to think about.
We - and especially our politicians and their lackeys - shout and scream about how our flags and symbols will remain for a thousand years etc but we conveniently forget how close we came to some alternative scenarios to what we have in the subcontinent today. And in our part of the subcontinent - Bengal and the North-East - the uncertainty and change - has probably been the strongest in the 20th century.
We also forget how things can change or evolve very easily and unpredictably going forward …