A Bangladeshi publisher, Shamsuzzoha Manik, has been arrested for violating the country’s Information and Communication Technology Act. Along with him, two others were also arrested: Shamsul Alam, the manager of the book stall and Fakir Taslim Uddin Kajol, owner of the press that printed the book, at the annual Dhaka book fair, the Amar Ekushey Boi Mela, for “selling books which might offend Muslims”.
Their booth was shut down and the trio was held for questioning by the police. One of the books that caused some people to complain to the police was Islam Bitorko (the Islam Debate), a collection of essays compiled by Manik. Other books dealt with topics such as Prophet Mohammad’s teachings on jihad, the role of women in Islam and atheism versus theism.
Last year at least six bloggers were killed in Bangladesh by persons/groups, who took offence at their reporting. The bloggers were atheists, having renounced Islam, in an increasingly conservative, Muslim-majority country. One of the victims was American- Bangladeshi, Avijit Roy, who was hacked to death during the last book fair. While the fact that they had apostatised was in itself sufficient to see them generally side-lined from Bangladeshi society, their individual decisions to comment negatively on religion in general, and on Islam in particular, led to their murders. According to the police, these murders were committed by Islamists, who felt that the bloggers had insulted Islam and, therefore, deserved to die.
Bangladesh’s Supreme Court recently caused an Islamist party, the Jamaat-e-Islami, to be deregistered and barred from contesting in future elections. Despite this, there has been little else done to curb the spread of conservative Islam through the madrasas, or religious schools, in rural areas. This has resulted in changes in dress, for instance, in those areas and, increasingly, in urban streets. It is this encroaching conservatism and its attendant unwillingness to countenance more liberal views that caused Manik to be arrested in a country that espouses secular tenets.
Of particular concern is the report that a group calling itself the Khelafat Andolon (Caliphate Movement), a hard-line extremist movement, had threatened to attack the book fair if Manik and the others were not arrested. His subsequent arrest would appear to indicate that the Bangladeshi authorities caved in to their demand.
It could be argued that the authorities made the arrests in order to prevent violence. Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheik Hasina must take – and be seen to take – immediate action against extremists who threaten bloggers and others to prevent her country from descending into an abyss of intolerance.