Taj Hashmi : A man who is becoming a total stranger to me

 Jamal Hasan  

Published on February 13, 2007

I have been following a continuous but steady barrage of postings dealing with one individual named Dr. Tajul-Islam Hashmi in different forums lately. At this point I am introducing his true name following bibliographical search of his scholarly work http://www.sas.upenn.edu/~dludden/agrhist_bdesh.htm Dr. Hashmi and I never met in person. Eight years ago, in an Internet debate titled "Intellectual Collaborator Debate" http://cyber_bangla0.tripod.com/Debate/NFB.html Dr. Hashmi was in my opposite camp. I recall in one posting he presented the probability that I could be someone who was changing political color with each regime change. Before that in another debate, which is called the Jinnah Debate http://cyber_bangla0.tripod.com/Debate/Jinnah_Debate.html, he termed Larry Collins' and Dominique Lapierre's book "Freedom at Midnight" as merely a toilet paper. Later on, in a rejoinder he aplogized for his unscholarly remark.  Much water has traversed in Padma and Potomac since then. Lately Dr. Hashmi became a fellow activist in our fight against political Islam by becoming a fellow activist of fatemolla. We saw his new role of being a part of a new world-wide anti-Political Islam movement, namely NO TO POLITICAL ISLAM [http://www.ntpi.org/].

I thought Dr. Hashmi of 1997 and Dr. Hashmi of 2005 are not the same. I thought because of his presumed "distaste" for mullaism, he would hardly be a fan of Khaleda-Nizami axis of evil. I thought the old Dr. Taj Hashmi has metamorphosed for the better. Apparently that is far from the reality. Unfortunately, in the recent days he simply disappointed me totally.

 

It started with two articles posted in Asiapeace, which the Canadian resident pedagogue terms as a group of liberal South Asians. The moderator of another e-forum forwarded me the texts of the Asiapeace opinions, one from Dr. Hashmi and the other from a Pakistani living in Saudi Arabia. The Saudi resident Pakistani's writing could be anything but a liberal viewpoint. He made a distorted version of the genesis of Bangladesh and made all the efforts to justify Pakistani army brutality. Dr. Hashmi on the other hand wrote a very much non-scholarly highly jargonized piece, which was primarily a typical Awami League bashing essay.

 

Dr. Hashmi has repeatedly made it clear that he is a historian. But his Asiapeace commentary could only unravel the superficial, extremely opinionated irrational side of his psyche. If the essay was written by a Jamaati activist that is one thing. It is hard to fathom the writer of "Musa Sadik's Essay on the Mujib Killing: My Rebuttal" in Asiapeace is also the author of "Peasant Utopia: The Communalization of Class Politics in East Bengal, 1920-1947." Dr. Bilayet Hossain dissected Hashmi's Asiapeace write-up. So, I am not going further on the subject.

 

It is simply impossible for a single individual to be an expert of all regional issues. I do not expect Dr. Hashmi to be well conversant of contemporary Algerian or Iranian history. But as a historian he ought to be more tactful about what he is going to express in public forums. In a recent posting titled "History, Myth, Concoction and Ignorance: In Response to Jaffor Ullah and Monsur Ibrahim" [News from Bangladesh, October 27, 2005] he gave the big bombshell. His sweeping comments about Algeria and Iran totally disappointed me. After reading the whole text, I wanted to believe someone using the good name of Dr. Taj Hashmi wrote the below average piece.

 

I thought as an avid proponent of NO TO POLITICAL ISLAM, Dr. Hashmi might have been a good analyst of Islamization issue of Bangladesh. I thought he could, with his scholarly background, could differentiate between the fundamental politial structures of the ruling parties of Indonesia and Bangladesh. Even a non-historian like myself can safely say, as far as ruling eliticism is concerned, the Indonesian mullas linked to Jemaah Islamiya http://www.fas.org/irp/world/para/ji.htm are nowhere close to the mullas linked to Jamat-i-Islami or Islami Oikkyo Jote of Bangladesh. That is the reason, Bangladesh has more potential to be rapidly Talibanized than any other South East Asian country.

 

In the NFB opinion of the 27th October, Dr. Hashmi brought the Algerian civil war and stunned me more. He put an illogical query, "Does anyone portray Algeria as the next Taliban state?" No, sir, at this moment Algeria having a powerful secular military establishment who are fighting the Islamists tooth and nail, the chance of Talibanization of that African country is not a possibility. Of course, if the secular army dominated Algerian regime listened to their people's choice and allowed the Islamic Salvation Front (Front Islamique du Salut) to rule the country, Algeria might have been a Sharia-based country today. I hope Dr. Hashmi could refresh his Algerian history for the sake of his dignity.

 

Turkish and Algerian military are nothing but card-carrying strong arm secular entities. On the other hand the Bangladeshi and Pakistani armies can be called anything but secular. Moreover, both of those South Asian militaries are infiltrated by Islamists to different levels. Having said that, I can draw a common denominator between the mlitary establishments of Turkey, Algeria and Pakistan. All of the three power brokers have  the benefit of providing the last word in their respective country's governance.

 

Now, I am going back to Dr. Hashmi's 27th October's commentary again. He started the eighth paragraph this way, "I am NOT at all surprised at Dr Ullah�s citing Bertil Lintner�s over-sensationalizing piece in the FEER and Wall Street Journal in April 2002 on the �impending Islamic revolution� in Bangladesh. I have written enough on the subject.....".  After reading that I almost fell off from my chair. Is Dr. Hashmi out of his mind? Isn't he aware of the well-coordinated simultaneous four hundred fifty bomb explosions across the country? Was that world record making incident less sensational than any of Bertil Lintner's dispatches? A few days ago, former U.S. Ambassador to Bangladesh Howard Schaffer gave an interview for the Voice of America - Bangla service. In the two parts interview, Ambassador Schaffer depicted a possible scenario of Bangladeshi jihadists' taking over the country's seat of power. Ambassador Schaffer said, that is his worst nightmare, which he did not wish to happen.

 

As I was going through Dr. Hashmi's NFB piece, I had more surprises to follow. His another paragraph started with such prophecy, "While Iran is gradually de-Islamizing itself and one assumes in the next ten years it will be a secular, liberal democracy, why should we buy Lintner-Griswold theses that Bangladesh is on the threshold of an Islamic revolution? Do you know, what the term �revolution� imply Dr Ullah?....."

 

I have been following Iranian politics for sometime. Other than studying accessible reading materials on Iranian affairs, I kept a regular linkage with sources in Iran through different channels. My motivation was to get a sense of Iranian people's mindset. When President Khatami was in power, I belonged to the optimistic bunch of analysts, whose pipe dream was to see Iran as a modern secular country. A few years ago a reporter from the leading American daily, namely Atlanta Journal-Constitution interviewed me on Iranian affairs. The newsstory titled "IRAN: Internal split thwart U.S. thaw" published on January 12, 2002 carried my name as a Iran watcher. As the reformist President Khatami was failing to deliver, my optimism about Iran's future was gradually dwindling. So, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's ascension to power and the country's gradual shift back to conservatism did not surprise me at all. That is why President Ahmadinejad's recent comment "Israel was a 'disgraceful blot', that should be 'wiped off the map'" did not raise my eyebrow a bit.  No, Dr. Hashmi, you are totally wrong. Contrary to your unsubstantiated prediction, Iran seems to be reinventing itself in energized Islamic utopia with full force. Most of the past gains in reformism and liberalism are thrown to the bunker.

 

Dr. Taj Hashmi said near the end, "Since I do not accept either Jinnah or Mujib as the fathers of the nations of Pakistan and Bangladesh, it does not mean that I disrespect them....." I have to challenge his honesty at this juncture. A little more than a month ago in Asiapeace the History scholar from Canada wrote, "One day Satan was missing. Finally he was found out at Road 32 (Mujib's residence), clinging the feet of Mujib. On asking the Satan responded: "I want to know the secret of Mujib's majic. I bluffed only two human beings (Adam and Eve) and God expelled me from the Paradise. This man is deceiving 75 million people (Bangladesh population in 1973) and God is totally indifferent about it". If that is a discourse of respectfulness, then we ought to change the definition of respect according to Dr. Hashmi's formula. 

I think Dr. Taj Hashmi, the lost soul in the world of history is becoming a total stranger to me.

 

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