Bangladesh Hindus

The Hindu Haroon Habib   June 3, 2013   The Sheikh Hasina Cabinet on Monday gave final approval to a draft law to ensure proper development and management of the “Devottar property” ( Hindu Charitable Endowments) and make the transfer of those property, donated to Hindu places of worship, completely illegal.   Once the law comes into effect all such property will come under effective control and opportunities will be created for their development, bringing benefit for the members of the Hindu community, said the government. Till now, such properties are managed by committees constituted locally.   The government would make a list of the property of charitable endowment of the Hindu community with the constitution of a management board.   Briefing the media, Cabinet Secretary Musharraf Hossain Bhuiyan said a central board would be constituted to regulate management of the properties. The vice-chairman of the Hindu Religious Welfare Trust wo...

Suvolaxmi Dutta Choudhury E-mail: misssuvo.dc@gmail.com   According to Article 123 of the Bangladeshi Constitution, it is mandatory that general elections should be held within ninety days of the dissolution of the National Assembly. This implies that the nation is set to go to polls no later than 24 January 2014. The imminent elections, set in the backdrop of the Shahbagh upsurge, will decide the fate of the arch rivalry between the ruling Awami League led by Sheikh Hasina and the opposition Bangladesh National Party (BNP) of Begum Khalida Zia. It would also have a determining influence on the nature of the Bangladeshi state vis-à-vis the recently throbbing debates on secularism. The crucial question that emerges here is, how has the Shahbagh movement impacted the prospects of the Awami League in the impending elections? Has the ostensibly non-political Shahbagh Square assumed a political colour by the close association of the Awami League with the up...

Washington, D.C. (June 7, 2013) -- "All they want is peace," said Samir Kalra, Esq., the Hindu American Foundation (HAF)'s Director and Senior Fellow for Human Rights, while describing his conversations with Pakistani Hindu refugees to a standing room only audience at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. on Wednesday. The Press Club event marked the formal release of the Foundation's ninth annual human rights report, entitled Hindus in South Asia and the Diaspora: A Survey of Human Rights 2012, intended to give voice to Hindu minorities that have "suffered indignity and injustice in silence" in many countries around the world.    The report provided detailed accounts of human rights violations in the areas of: violence against women, forced conversions, mass violence, temple destruction, socio-political ostracization, economic and political marginalization, and discriminatory laws in nine countries and one state in India.    HAF's late...

Hindu American Foundation Namaste HAF Supporters, We need you to make TWO 30 second calls today: Call your Congressman and the House Foreign Affairs Committee. As the HAF delegation prepares to hit the halls of Congress next week for the 10th Annual DC Advocacy Days, we need your help in laying the groundwork on an important and timely issue. What is the issue? We are asking the House Foreign Affairs Committee to hold a hearing on the escalating violence against minorities, mainly Hindus, in Bangladesh.  The most recent violence follows the convictions of three Jamaat-e-IsIami (JeI) leaders by the International Crimes Tribunal for engaging in "crimes against humanity" during Bangladesh's 1971 War of Independence from Pakistan, when an estimated three million people were killed and 200,000 women raped. JeI is a radical Islamist political organization seeking to create a theocratic Islamic state in Bangladesh.  Since late January, large-scale violence...

Dated 22-May-2013 By Bhaskar Roy   It was inevitable and had to happen, because some politicians in Bangladesh have conscience.   Recently, some senior leaders of the main opposition party, the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), told the media, on condition of anonymity, that their Chairperson Begum Khaleda Zia was being misled by some close to her to make statements that were both damaging to her and their party.  These leaders did not take any names, but mentioned some “party outsiders” and a particular “leftist-turned-Islamist jihadi intellectual”, and that a section of Khaleda Zia’s staff, including some retired civil servants and military officers, helped this jehadi intellectual to influence her.  Names may not have been mentioned, but for those within the party and other politicians and the media, the accused people would have been quickly identified. Cracks within the BNP had become evident for almost a year now.  Sections of the party’s youth ...

Washington, D.C.(May 15, 2013) - Decrying a steep rise in atrocities against religious minorities, an international religious freedom coalition of 23 organizations and individuals led by the Hindu American Foundation urged the U.S. House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee to host a Congressional hearing on the ongoing persecution of religious minorities in Bangladesh.   According to the Coalition, large-scale anti-minority violence, widespread restrictions on religious freedom, and the growing influence and power of radical Islamist groups, such as Jamaat-e-Islami (JeI) and Hefazat-e-Islam, have resulted in a rapidly deteriorating situation for religious minorities in Bangladesh.   "It's critical that Congress, and specifically the House Foreign Affairs Committee, holds a hearing to examine the growing threat that Islamic extremist groups, including Jamaat-e-Islami, pose to vulnerable religious minorities as well as to Bangladesh's internal security...

Bangladesh Hindus, Boudhas and Christians staged a protest gathering at Dundas Square in Toronto of Ontario on 28th April 2013 at 3pm organised by Bangladesh Hindu Boudha and Christian Oikya Parishad  in order to protest against atrocities by Islamic thugs belong to different political parties and its affiliate organisations. According to available reports 319 Hindu temples and more than 1500 Hindu houses and business had been burnt and destroyed in between 28th Feb 2013 and 23rd March 2013. 2 Hindus had been brutally killed. Still everyday temple burning reports are coming. The destruction occurred in 32 districts out of 64 districts of Bangladesh.            

Dated 23-Apr-2013 By Bhaskar Roy In the last three months Bangladesh has plunged into a strife ridden situation where politics is being pushed by extreme religious ideas. Some foreign forces seem to relish in further provoking a situation which goes against the current global trend to eradicate fundamentalist forces and terrorism. The reason? The ruling Awami League government decided to establish two International War Crimes Tribunals (ICT) to try the 1971 liberation war criminals who had opted to actively oppose independence from Pakistan. If these people had opposed only politically, that would have been another case. But they went much further and committed inhuman crimes against the people that defy description. They slaughtered more than three million nationalists, raped more than 200 thousand women. Not even the old, the infirm and children were spared. These people, who now identify themselves as Bangladeshis or Bengalis, were far more  vicious and rapacious t...

Dated 28-Mar-2013 By Bhaskar Roy   Begum Khaleda Zia, Chairperson of the main opposition party in Bangladesh, is a two-time Prime Minister of Bangladesh.  She and her party also took to the streets in 1992 in a joint movement with the Awami League to oust General and President H.M. Ershad’s military government.  Her husband, Gen, Zia-ur-Rahman, usurped the post of the President of the country, ran a martial law government to start with, lived by the sword, and died by it.   The assassination of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and his family on August 15, 1975 ushered in the politics of Martial Law and military rule  like Pakistan. The BNP and its ally the Jamaat tried to sponsor a military coup in 2006, but were pre-empted by some top army leaders.  But there was the shadow of the army over the caretaker government when the famous “minus two” theory – exile both Khaleda Zia and Sk. Hasina, was tried.  A new party to be led by a particular celebr...

Washington, D.C. (April 12, 2013)   --  " We want justice, we want justice ," was the chant heard from a crowd of over 300 demonstrators, mostly of Bengali origin, on Wednesday in front of the White House. The rally, organized by the Bangladesh Hindu Buddhist Christian Unity Council (BHBCUC) and the Hindu American Foundation (HAF), urged the United States government to use its influence to stop the rampant persecution of Hindus and other religious minorities in Bangladesh.    Many of the participants spoke of their first hand experience with persecution they endured during Bangladesh's 1971 war of independence and the ongoing violent campaigns that have occurred since.    "The rece nt tragedies faced by the Hindu community of Bangladesh are reflective of the violent attacks that we faced in 1971 and again in 2 001," said Sitanghsu Guha, an advisor to BHBCUC. "In a report presented to Congress, Senator Ted Kennedy shed invaluable light on the tar...

Raja Sitaram Ray ( Bengali : রাজা সীতারাম রায় ) (1658–1714) was an autonomous king, a vassal to the Mughal Empire , who revolted against the Empire and established a short lived sovereign Hindu dominion in Bengal .   Raja Sita Ram Ray Palace Raja Sita Ram Ray Palace Contents   1 Early life 1.1 Ancestry 1.2 Childhood 1.3 Early adulthood 2 Career 2.1 Reign as jagirdar 2.2 Reign as monarch 2.3 Conflict with the Mughals 3 Welfare 3.1 Water reservoirs 3.2 Temples 4 Marriages and children 5 References 6 Further reading 7 External links Early life Ancestry Sitaram came from the Kashyap Das clan , one of the nine clans that constitute the Uttar Rarhi Kayasthas . The clan was settled in the Fatehsingh region of Murshidabad . Ramdas Khan Gajdani, who became famous in the early 15th century by donating a golden elephant at his mother's sraddha , belonged to this family. His son, Anantaram Das, was an official in ...