Extremists began by asserting control over women's bodies.
In the political void that emerged after the overthrow of Bangladeshi authoritarian leaders, a religious fundamentalist in one town declared that young women could no longer play football. In another case, they forced the police to release a man who harassed a woman by not covering her hair in public, covering him in a flower wreath.
More brave calls followed. Protesters at a rally in Dhaka, the capital, warned that if the government does not give the death penalty to those who disparage Islam, they will execute them with their own hands. A few days later, the banned group held a massive march calling for Islamic caliphate.
As Bangladesh seeks to rebuild its democracy and chart a new future for 175 million people, the streak of Islamic extremism that has long been lurking beneath the country's secular façades bubble to the surface.
In the interview, representatives of several Muslim parties and organizations (previously prohibited) were working to push Bangladesh in a more fundamentalist direction.
Muslim leaders argue that Bangladesh will build a “Islamic government” that will punish those who disregard Islam and enforce “humility,” and create ambiguous concepts that have given way to vigilance and theocratic rule elsewhere.
Officials on the political spectrum, drafting the new constitution, acknowledged that the document would likely drop secularism as a critical feature of Bangladesh, replace it with pluralism, and redraw the country along more religious lines.
The fundamentalist turn is particularly painful for female students who helped expel the country's oppressive prime minister, Sheikh Hasina.
They wanted her one-party rules to be replaced with democratic openness that corresponds to the diversity of the country. But now they find themselves competing with religious populism, particularly those leaving women and religious minorities, including Hindus and loyal women of small denominations of Islam.
“We were at the forefront of the protest. We protected our brothers on the street,” said Sheikh Tasnim Afros Emi, 29, a sociology graduate from Dhaka University. “Now, five or six months later, everything has turned up.”
Critics say the country's interim government, led by 84-year-old Nobel Laureate Muhammad Yunus, has not been pushed back strongly against extremist forces. They accuse Yunus of being lost in the weeds of soft, democratic reform, dislike conflict and unable to articulate a clear vision as extremists occupy more public spaces.
Inside him, EU explains the delicate act of balancing. They must protect their freedom of speech and the right to protest after years of authoritarianism, but doing so provides an opening for extremist demands.
Police, who remained largely abandoned and moraleless after Hasina's fall, are no longer able to hold the line. The military, which has taken on several police duties, is increasingly at odds with the interim government and the student movement, which wants officers to hold them accountable for past atrocities.
What is beginning to happen in Bangladesh reflects the wave of fundamentalism that consumed the region.
Afghanistan has become an extreme ethnic religious nation, depriving women of their most fundamental freedoms. In Pakistan, Muslim extremists have demonstrated their will through violence for years. In India, the established Hindu right-wing is undermining the traditions of secular democratic countries. Myanmar is being grabbed by Buddhist extremists who oversee the campaign for ethnic cleansing.
Nahid Islam, a student leader who was the government minister of Bangladesh's interim government before recently leaving to lead a new political party, admitted that the country's sliding towards extremism is “there is the fear there.”
However, he hopes that despite constitutional changes, values such as democracy, cultural diversity, and aversion to religious extremism will be brought about. “I don't think we can build a nation in Bangladesh that goes against these fundamental values,” he said.
Some refer to Bengali culture, which has a deep tradition of art and intellectual debate. Others find hope in the form of the country's economy.
Women are highly integrated into Bangladesh's economy, with 37% in the formal workforce, one of the highest fees in South Asia.
The militant forces are trying to push their path into photographs 15 years after Hasina suppressed and softened them.
She ran through police conditions that cracked down on Muslim elements, including those close to mainstream that could pose political challenges. At the same time, she tried to beat the religiously conservative bases of the Islamic Party by allowing thousands of unregulated Islamic religious seminaries and putting in billions to build hundreds of mosques.
With Hasina gone, the little extremist costumes that want to completely overturn the system, and the more mainstream Islamists who want to work within a democratic system, appear to be converging on the common goals of a more conservative Bangladeshi.
Jamaat e Islami, the largest Islamic party, sees a great opportunity. The party, which is responsible for large business investments, is playing a long-term game, analysts and diplomats said. While it is unlikely to win the expected elections at the end of the year, the party hopes to express the credibility of mainstream secular parties.
Jamaat's general secretary, Mia Golam Palwar, said the party wanted an Islamic welfare state. The closest model for the combination of religion and politics is turkey, he said.
“Islam provides moral guidelines for both men and women in terms of behavior and ethics,” Palwar said. “Women can participate in any occupation of sports, singing, theater, judicial, military and bureaucratics within these guidelines.”
However, in the current vacuum, men at the local level have come up with their own interpretations of Islamic governance.
In the agricultural town of Taraganj, a group of organizers decided last month to hold a soccer match between two young women's teams. The goal was to provide entertainment and inspire local girls.
However, as preparations began, Ashraf Ali, the leader of the town's mosque, declared that women and girls should not be allowed to play football.
Sports organizers usually announce the game details by sending speakers tied to rickshaws around town. Ali matched them by sending her speakers to warn them not to attend.
On February 6th, local officials were holding meetings about the game as players had changed to classroom jerseys and dressing rooms. Ali declared that he “wanted to be a martian rather than allowing a match,” said one of the organizers, Sirajru Islam.
The local administration fell into the spot, announcing the cancellation of the game and placing the area under a curfew.
Taslima Aktar, 22, who traveled four hours by bus to play in the game, said he saw “a lot of cars, the army, the police.”
Aktal said this was the first time she has faced such opposition while playing football in her decade.
“I'm a little scared of what's going to happen right now,” she said.
Organizers were able to perform women's matches in the presence of dozens of security forces a few weeks later. However, as a precaution, they asked the young women to wear stockings under their shorts.
Due to the unrelenting threat of preachers, organizers said they were not sure if they would take the risk again.
In the interview, Ali, the mosque leader, shined with pride. In rural areas like Taraganj, women's soccer contributes to “indecentness,” he said.
Women's sports was his latest cause. For years, he has been preaching and petitioning Ahmadiya, a longtime ethnic minority Muslim community, and attempting to drive 500 members out of his area.
Ahmadiya's places of worship were attacked by mobs on the night Hasina's government collapsed. The Ahmadiyya community lives in fear. Their attendance in the prayer hall has been reduced by half.
They are not permitted to reconstruct the destroyed signs of the hall or broadcast calls to prayer from speakers. Ali was not responsible for the violence. However, the sermons of preachers like him declare the Ahmadiya heretics who need to be exiled and continue blare.
“The public is respectful,” said AKM Shafiqul Islam, president of the local Ahmadhya branch. “But these religious leaders are against us.”
