Peace and Justice

6

Politics of Secularism in Bangladesh

Lailufar Yasmin

The state of Bangladesh came into existence with secular ideas as one of its founding principles. In the long struggle for an identity for the people of Bangladesh, secularism was one of the principal forces. But soon after the country was formed, secularism as an ideal came under attack. Not only was the ideology of secularism challenged, the idea itself took a backseat, with the revivalism of religion in the domestic politics of Bangladesh. This chapter argues that the faulty process of embracing secularism and the inability to define secularism, both made the sustenance of secularism unlikely in Bangladesh. For an in-depth analysis of the issue, we have to go back to the process of bifurcation ...