Anti-Ahmadiyya agitation

By Sakhawat Hossain, Gulshan
28 January 2004, 18:00 PM
By banning the books and publications of the Ahmadiyya sect, our government has caved in to the unjustified demands by the fanatics. It is not the business of the government to declare anybody as Muslim or non Muslim and in fact it is beyond its constitutional powers. Ahmadiyyas in Bangladesh are mostly educated and law-abiding citizens and they deserve freedom of worship and protection. Many people of the mainstream Sunni sect do not consider Ahmadiyyas as Muslims and they have their reasons. They are free to do so and let them, if they wish, shun the Ahmadiyyas in religious and social matters. But that does not justify attacking Ahmadiyya mosques or bully them right and left.

Today it is the Ahmadiyyas, tomorrow it will be some other sect. We have to ask ourselves whether we want to end up in the same situation as Pakistan is facing now where Shias are massacred in their mosques and bombs thrown inside Christian churches.

The real losers of this anti-Ahmadiyya agitation are the country as a whole and the tolerant society that we have had so far.