BANGLADESH - RISING RADICALISM

THE GROWING ISLAMIST INFLUENCE RAISES CONCERN IN INDIA EVEN AS THE PERSECUTION OF HINDUS CONTINUES

- ARKAMOY DATTA MAJUMDAR and RAJ CHENGAPPA

AS the sedan ferrying three pilgrims along National Highway 106 in Chittagong, 250 km from capital city Dhaka, stopped at the gates of the Pundarik Dham in the rural enclave of Mekhal, the travellers were overcome by a sense of reverence. Believed to be the birthplace of the Vaishnavite seer Pundarik Vidyanidhi, a contemporary of the great 16th-century saint Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, the verdant 21-acre campus is an oasis of calm, dotted with flowering plants and abundant water bodies. Built in 1921, the temple's management was taken over by the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON) in 1982. Today, it is a favourite pilgrimage spot for Bangladesh's minority Hindus. And it was this piece of divinity that the three visitors on that day had come to partake in. Except that the air of serenity was soon broken by the heavily armed security personnel stationed outside the temple, who sprang up to enforce a security check. Though the men were waved through quickly, there was no missing the undercurrent of tension.

In recent weeks, this spiritual haven has become the epicentre of a temporal tempest that has strained relations between India and the new political dispensation in Bangladesh led by the Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus, chief advisor of the country's interim government. In the eye of the storm is the tonsured Chinmoy Krishna Das, the temple's president, and vocal critic of atrocities against minorities. Arrested on November 25 on charges of sedition, his detention has triggered a cascade of violent events that has left the Hindus in Bangladesh living in anxiety and fear. The fallout has been swift and severe.