Bangladeshi Member of Parliament (MP) Moinuddin Khan Badal lashed out at the Indian, Pakistani and Bangladeshi governments on Thursday for failing to resolve even a single dispute in the Indian subcontinent over the years.
Urging South Asians to promote people-to-people contact through Track-II diplomacy, the Bangladeshi parliamentarian flayed the governments in New Delhi, Islamabad and Dhaka for failing to bridge the differences between the people of South Asia who, Badal said, share a historical, cultural, ecological and geographical heritage.
“We have concluded that the more the people of the Subcontinent interact [with each other], they will find their own solutions,” the visiting Bangladeshi lawmaker told journalists at the Karachi Press Club.
Referring to lingering territorial and water disputes between the three neighbours, he said the governments in the three countries are yet to seek an amicable solution to the longstanding issue of Kashmir or the disputes pertaining to the Indo-Bangladesh border and the Indo-Pakistan water reserves.
Terming the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) “a rich man’s club”, Khan said the only solution to promote mutual harmony among the three states is Track-II diplomacy.
The Bengali lawmaker urged the governments in the three countries to allow journalists, doctors, intellectuals and social activists to move across the borders to work as ambassadors of peace.
“Terrorists do not care about or need a visa to move across the borders. It is the common people who want visas, so allow them,” Khan said.
He urged journalists to use their pens, which he said were mightier than weapons, to make the governments in the Subcontinent develop cordial relations.
He lamented the fact that while the people of Europe, Africa and South America have formed their unions, the South Asians had failed to progress on this front.
“South Asians cannot come up with a South Asian union. It is a shame! I would ask the governments that there should be a concrete resolution to this issue.”
To a question regarding his country’s trial of those accused for the “Dhaka debacle”, the lawmaker clarified that only those who had committed crimes against humanity are being prosecuted.
“We are conducting a trial against those who had issued orders to or had themselves looted, raped or killed,” Khan said.
The Bengali legislator said despite having lost his family members in the 1971 war with the Pakistan Army, he bears “no malice against the great people of Pakistan”.
Khan replied in the negative when asked if fundamentalism is rising in his country, saying there is a secular democratic government in Bangladesh where all state institutions, including the army, know their constitutional limits.
He stressed the need for a “common curriculum” as a remedy to the promotion of religious extremism in madrassas.
"He stressed the need for a “common curriculum” as a remedy to the promotion of religious extremism in madrassas."
What these secular people mean is that they want to suppress and not allow some of what Prophet Muhammad (phuh) said, and allow some of what he did say. In other words, they want to manipulate the religion of Islam to suit their desires and secular lifestyle. Secular people, in the heart of their essence, are not, in fact, muslims, but try to give the appearance of one. They are known as "munafik", or hypocrites in Islam. They were there in the prophet's time, and they are still here now, and they will always be amongst us. We just have to learn to recognise them in our minds and deal with them in a civil way, whilst not allowing them to undermine Islam in any way.
Zahir Khan,
You comments like a backdated people of primitive society.What you want to do with other belivers?you want to force them to convert or you like to live with them togather with peacefull atmosphere?.and will try to bring friend ship to promote buisness and prosperity in this region.
Kamrul
Many respected Muslim scholars are speaking up against the false and malicious propaganda that secularism is against Islam. Although secularism involves the matter of religion, it is, at its core a constitutional issue, not a religious one. Secularism guarantees citizens the freedom of practicing their own faith without persecution or denigration into a 2nd class citizen. In that sense it was India under Muslim rule of more than 1000 years that had shown the model of secularism, not Europe. To speak of secularism as a Western idea is false, and a deliberate attempt to hide the great model of our own subcontinental model. This is kufri of the worst kind. What about the greatest model of all — the Charter of Medina signed by our beloved Nabi (PBUH)?
Islam, the youngest of the Abrahamic religions, is automatically a very accomodating religion by virtue of its acceptance of all the Prophets of the Jews and Christians. It is the most 'secular' or worldly religion.
Many respected Muslim scholars are making a stand against the false propaganda of depicting secularism as an opposition to Islam. We have a 1000 year model of secularism here in the Indian subcontinent under Muslim rulers. During those centuries India was the wealthiest nation on earth.
The greatest model of secularism was established by Muhammad (PBUH), the Messenger of Allah, when he signed the Medina Charter.
Being the youngest of the Abrahamic religions, Islam is automatically accommodating all the Prophets of the Jews and the Christians.
Whether a State should be declared secular or not is not a religious issue; it is a constitutional issue. Secularism guarantees freedom of religion to all of the citizens of a state without bias or reasons for making anyone a 2nd class citizen on account of his or her faith.
Muslim rulers of India never declared Islam as a "state" religion.
GOOD comment but did people really know anything about secularism in those days?
The point is that secularism was being practiced in the time of the Prophet and the Muslim Mughal rulers of India, even if it was not labelled as "secularism". The concept is not new to Islam, it is compatible with Islam and is the solution to what ails us today. Given the sectarianism within Islam itself, secularism is the answer not only to making peace among fellow Muslims of different sects but also among Muslims, and followers of other religions as well as those who do not subscribe to any religion at all. We need to allow everyone to follow their own conscience in religious matters and this is possible in a secular state. Islam is in no danger and never has been especially in Pakistan with a 97% Muslim majority. The only danger is to political agendas which exploit religion to oppress people.
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