Learning from a dismantled cult in Bangladesh

Political cults are never permanent. Vested parties don’t stop at narrative building but go as far as legislating the cult’s creed into law, once it acquires political power. History is instructive that the more unreasonable a cult is, the more force is deployed to establish it. Invariably, the political party that births the cult leader, becomes secondary to the identity of cult leaders themselves. It happened with the Communist Party in deference to Stalin, Ba’ath Party in subordination to Saddam Hussein, or more recently, to the Awami League deifying Bangabandhu (friend of Bengal) Sheikh Mujibur Rahman.

An important facet of cult building is reimagining and redefining history. Sometimes, factual history must be disowned with the diminishment of the heroes of the past, even if they belong to the same partisan persuasion of the new cult leader. ‘Othering’ of those who do not conform to the new template is inevitable. Internal purge of those who potentially challenge the new cult leader from within the same ideological framework, seemingly reassures the cult leader of permanence. The conflation of the identity of the nation to that of the new cult leader (through electoral means of majoritarianism or through suppression or manipulation) caps the cult-building exercise. But as the fate of Mujibur Rahman, the Shah of Iran, or Bashar al Assad confirms, cult building cannot survive the vicissitudes of time.

Only those legacies that are truly beyond partisanship survive the test of time. Bhagat Singh may have been inspired by Communist-Marxist ideology but is today championed across the ideological divide for inspiring the Indian freedom movement. Nelson Mandela is imagined beyond the leadership of the African National Congress, just as the legacy of the most popular President of the United States, Abraham Lincoln, is not confined to the Republicans. Similarly, Mahatma Gandhi is not solely contextualised to his partisan anchorage i.e., the Congress party, certainly not in its current avatar.

For such timeless leaders, their original partisan mooring only defined their ideological moorings and means, but the purpose of the nation was always larger and beyond partisanship. Interestingly, their essence is never predicated on infallibility, perfection, or any divine benefaction – on the contrary, they are known to have occasionally erred and be human enough to admit. Hence their legacies remain Teflon-coated and persist, even if the same discomforts the subsequent attempts to create new cults, especially if the new cult leader is rooted in fundamental ideas inimical to those of these founding fathers. Therefore, practices like renaming places or national symbols are commonplace, as are the encouraged murmurs to rewrite the constitution.

Dismantling of the deliberately cultivated cult of Bangladeshi leader Mujibur Rahman is yet another reminder of what eventually happens whenever a politician is sought to be elevated to pantheons of Godlikeness. There is no denying that Bangladesh owes its freedom to the leadership of Mujibur Rahman, along with the invaluable and decisive hand of India defeating Pakistan in 1971. However, it is the overexploitation of Mujibur’s undeniable role in Bangladeshi freedom movement to suppress all subsequent opposition (in independent Bangladesh), first by himself, and later by his politician daughter, Sheikh Hasina, that was to be the undoing of his cult.

Inevitable, inescapable end

Today, many in India are horrified by the implosive turn of events which even led to the recent demolition of Mujibur Rahman’s house, 32 Dhanmondi, in a symbol of desecrating the politics of the ousted Sheikh Hasina. Six months earlier, like the statues of Stalin or Saddam Hussein, a large golden statue (commissioned by Sheikh Hasina) of Mujibur Rahman was dramatically destroyed and toppled by an irate mob. The anti-cult rebound to ‘Mujibism’ was waiting to happen.

Given India’s genealogical equation with Awami League and its recent penchant for binary assumptions on international relations, many forget that in less than four years of taking charge, Mujibur Rahman and almost his entire family were assassinated in a coup d’etat of organic outrage by the disillusioned citizenry of Bangladesh. Mujibur Rahman himself had much to do with the regression of the situation with his turn to undemocratic authoritarianism. He had effectively reduced Bangladesh to a One-Party State. Telltale phraseology of insecure leadership and therefore compromising with the democratic traditions was inherent in his insincere justification, “The freedom has been abused and misused by certain people for their personal benefits”. His public expressions were typically peppered with statements denouncing “anti-national elements” who had been “ruining our country” and then promised, “The first revolution brought us independence and the second will bring us economic prosperity” against anyone who disagreed with his mandate or relevance. He ‘managed’ the headlines for some time till the media itself lost all credibility and the pain of Mujibur’s hubris became apparent to Bangladeshis at large. His two political successors and rivals i.e., Ziaur Rahman and Muhammad Ershad ensured that Mujibur’s veneration was moderated, and he returned to public consciousness with a vengeance with the return of his daughter, Sheikh Hasina, in 2008.

The pattern of cult formation and its eventual fate is consistent across countries, though only the time taken for the journey to run its course varies depending on the country and its circumstances. Only those who are given to accommodation of the metaphorical ‘others’ in democracy earn the rare respect across the partisan divide to earn a fine legacy, and not a cult. Two leaders who practised inclusivity even though from the opposite sides of the Indian political spectrum i.e., Jawaharlal Nehru and Atal Behari Vajpayee, will be remembered across the partisan aisles. Though political rivals, they afforded each other much dignity as equal patriots. The road to a ‘muscular’ cult is more tempting but earning a more constitutional and civilisational legacy is always a nobler and more sustaining outcome. Such statesmanship rather than cult-like bravado always proves better for the nation in the long run, and the optics emerging from Bangladesh only prove the point.

(The writer is a former Lt Governor of Andaman & Nicobar and Puducherry)