Bangladesh: New Textbooks To Credit Ziaur Rahman For Declaration Of Independence; Court Denies Bail To Hindu Monk Chinmoy

Politics under the interim government is evolving as Bangladesh introduced new textbooks that state that Ziaur Rahman declared the country’s independence in 1971, replacing the previous ones that credit founding father Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman with the declaration.

Not only that this announcement comes on a day when a court rejected the bail plea of Hindu monk Chinmoy Krishna Das. Das' arrest triggered widespread protests and increase in communal attacks against Hindus in Bangladesh in the last two months of 2024.

Bangladesh's instability began when a nation-wide student-led protest led to the fall of Sheikh Hasina's government on August 5, 2024, and eventually Mohammad Yunus's appointment as the Chief advisor of the interim government. After Yunus came to power, there have been a series of attacks on Hindu community members and their places of worship.

Bangladesh Court Denies Bail To Hindu Monk

A court in Bangladesh on Thursday denied bail to a Hindu priest and a former ISKCON leader in a sedition case.

Chinmoy Krishna Das appeared at the hearing virtually.

Nazim Uddin Chowdhury, president of the Chattogram District Bar Association told the local Bangladesh news channel, “the state objected to the bail, saying that it was a sedition case and the highest punishment was life in prison."

“Chattogram Metropolitan Sessions Judge Saiful Islam rejected the bail plea after hearing arguments from both sides for around 30 minutes,” Metropolitan Public Prosecutor Advocate Mofizul Haque Bhuiyan told The Daily Star.

Das' lawyer, Apurba Kumar Bhattacharjee, said they plan to appeal to the High Court for bail, it added.

Das, formerly with the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON), was arrested at the Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport in Dhaka on November 25.

Das' bail was rejected on November 26 by Chattogram's 6th Metropolitan Magistrate Kazi Shariful Islam in the sedition case. He was sent to jail.

This decision angered members of the Hindu community, who staged a protest around the prison van outside the court leading to violent clashes during which a lawyer Saiful Islam Alif was killed.

Bangladesh To Introduce New School Books To Remove Mujibur Rahman As 'Father of Nation'

The Daily Star newspaper reported that the new textbooks for primary and secondary students have several changes. They will also be removing Mujibur Rahman's title of "Father of the Nation."

Prof AKM Reazul Hassan, chairman of the National Curriculum and Textbook Board has explained to the local newspaper that the new textbooks for the 2025 academic year will state that on March 26, 1971, Ziaur Rahman declared the independence of Bangladesh, and on March 27, he made another declaration of independence on behalf of Bangabandhu.

The information has been included in the free textbooks where the matter of the declaration was mentioned, he added.

According to the paper, writer and researcher Rakhal Raha, who was involved in the process of making changes in the textbooks, said they tried to free the textbooks from "exaggerated, imposed history".

"Those who revised the textbooks found that it wasn't fact-based information that Sheikh Mujibur Rahman sent the wireless message [declaring independence] while being arrested by the Pakistani army, and so they decided to remove it."

Earlier, in the textbooks of classes one to 10, the information on who made the Declaration of Independence was changed according to the government in power, the paper said.

It is widely believed among supporters of Awami League that Mujibur Rahman had made the announcement and that Ziaur Rahman, who was an Army major and later a sector commander of the Liberation War, merely read out the declaration upon Mujib's instructions.

Earlier, Bangladesh decided to start the process of erasing the image of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman from its currency notes as it phases out the old notes.

The move came after the ouster of his daughter Sheikh Hasina as prime minister on August 5. His statues and murals bearing his image were targeted as his daughter fled to India.

The interim government also cancelled a national holiday on August 15, marking the assassination of Mujibur Rahman.