Photo: Farzana Hossen
First of all, I would like to thank all 26 of the students in this workshop for being willing to undertake hard labor and endure pressure to push limits, break boundaries and grow. If have been critical in the beginning, it was because of my own passionate belief that they could succeed at a level they might not themselves imagine. I feel a responsibility to give them this opportunity to concentrate on what is most important, and to discover the joy in that hard, demanding work.
I am very happy that they now understand that photography is about self-discovery. I am pleased, and they should be pleased, about this wonderful work. This is their moment, and they should enjoy every bit of it.
A special thanks to Shehab, who has been very important in helping this to succeed. Morten Krogvold January 2011 ?
Can a formal bilateral communiqu? be a ?game changer?, foretell a ?paradigm shift?, in a Southasian relationship? If India and Bangladesh manage to follow through on promises to open up their economies for transit and trade as set out in a memorandum of January 2010, a new era could dawn across the land borders of Southasia. The challenges are bureaucratic inertia in New Delhi and ultra-nationalist politics in Dhaka.
The political partition of the Subcontinent in 1947 did not have to lead to economic partition, but that is ultimately what happened. This did not take place right away, and many had believed that the borders of India and Pakistan?s eastern and western flanks were demarcations that would allow for the movement of people and commerce. It was as late as the India-Pakistan war of 1965 that the veins and capillaries of trade were strangulated. In the east, in what was to become Bangladesh just a few years later, the river ferries and barges that connected Kolkata with the deltaic region, and as far up as Assam, were terminated. The metre-gauge railway lines now stopped at the frontier, and through-traffic of buses and trucks came to a halt. The latest act of separation was for India to put up an elaborate barbed-wire fence along much of the 4000 km border, a project that is nearly complete. Today, what mainly passes under these wires are Bangladeshi migrants seeking survival in the faraway metropolises of India ? and contraband.
Photo credit: Sworup Nhasiju
This half-century of distancing between what was previously one continuous region has resulted in incalculable loss of economic vitality, most of it hidden under nationalist bombast. Bangladesh lost a huge market and source of investment, even as the heretofore natural movement of people in search of livelihood suddenly came to be termed ?illegal migration?. Bangladeshis were wounded by the unilateral construction of the Farakka Barrage on the Ganga/Padma, a mere 10 km upstream from the border, which deepened the anti-Indian insularity of Dhaka?s new nationalist establishment. Forced to chart its own course, Bangladesh concentrated on developing its own soil and society, uniquely building mega-NGOs such as Proshika, BRAC and Grameen, developing a healthy domestic industrial sector such as in garment manufacture, and learning to deal with disastrous floods and cyclones.
In India, the lack of contact and commerce led increasingly to an evaporation of empathy for Bangladesh, which became an alien state rather than a Bangla-speaking sister Southasian society. The opinion-makers of mainland India wilfully ignored the interests of the Indian Northeast, which they see as an appendage with no more than four percent of the national population. The seven states of the Northeast, meanwhile, became weakened economically with the denial of access to Bangladesh?s market and the proximate ports on the Bay of Bengal. Mainland India, of course, could easily afford to maintain its strategic and administrative control through the ?chicken?s neck? of the Siliguri corridor, but few considered the economic opportunities lost to the Northeast over five decades.
Distrust and xenophobia in Bangladesh, the imperial aloofness of New Delhi, and the Northeast?s lack of agency delivered a status quo in disequilibrium in the northeastern quadrant of Southasia that has lasted decades. Unexpectedly, there is a hint of change. A relatively little-remarked-upon memorandum between the prime ministers of Bangladesh and India holds out the possibility of erasing the anti-historical legacy of closed borders and rigid economies.
It was a welcome opportunity to meet Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina during her official visit to the UK. Three of us, Lord Eric Avebury of the UK House of Lords, Brad Adams of Human Rights Watch and I met the Prime Minister on 30 January at her hotel suite in London.
Bangladesh Foreign Minister, Dr Dipu Moni and the Bangladesh High Commissioner to the UK, Dr Sayeedur Rahman Khan were also present at the meeting.
We began with a discussion on the war crimes trials, restrictions on human rights groups visiting Chittagong Hill Tracts, and the continued delay in implementing the Chittagong Hill Tracts Accord (CHT) that was signed in 1997 during Sheikh Hasina?s previous tenure as Prime Minister.
The Prime Minister said she was committed to implementing the CHT Accord and had set up a committee to advise her on how to implement it.
The Foreign Minister said the government was aware of the concerns the International Bar Association had raised about the law under which war crimes will be tried. She said the government had sought the opinion of legal experts on those concerns and that the amended law incorporates their advice. She said the process is to heal wounds, and the government is looking at all issues in relation to the trials, and the rule of law would be followed.
The law denies, among other things, the right to challenge the jurisdiction of the Tribunal and the right to the possibility of bail but it was not clear if the government would move to amend the law.
I told the Prime Minister that Amnesty International welcomes the government?s move to make the National Human Rights Commission permanent and asked for her assurances that it would remain independent and well resourced. Also, the government?s move to try Bangladesh Rifle mutineers in civilian courts, as against courts martial, was welcome.
I expressed concern that the government?s move to address some of the human rights concerns appear to favour only members of her own party, the Awami League. There is a long, unwelcome legacy in Bangladesh for governments to go soft on the criminal activities of members of their own party and harsh on the opposition. I asked why the only known cases of the government pardoning death penalty convicts were 20 convicts, 19 of whom were members of the governing Awami League. I also expressed concern about the activities of the Bangladesh Chattra League (BCL), the student wing of the Awami League, and the serious allegations of human rights abuses by this grouping, which have gone unpunished.
The Foreign Minister said the deaths sentences had been politically motivated and for that reason the prisoners have been pardoned. I was dismayed as I had hoped to hear a commitment to pardoning more death penalty convicts and the exercise of utmost impartiality in choosing who to pardon.
The Prime Minister said she had taken action against the BCL members. Some have been arrested for committing crimes and some have been expelled from the Awami League.
I explained that torture continues to be widespread and asked the Prime Minister if her government would consider implementing the 2003 Supreme Court ruling that provides guidelines for torture free investigation of suspects. This question remained unanswered.
I referred to statements the Prime Minister had made before and after the 2008 elections that extrajudicial executions would end. Yet, they continue and nothing seems to be done to stop them.
The Prime Minister said extrajudicial executions have been happening since 2004 and she has been very vocal on the issue from that time. She said they could not stop overnight. She said all incidents are investigated, and if any officer is found to have committed a crime ?immediately we take action against it?.
I agree that extrajudicial executions cannot stop overnight, but work to stop them can begin straight away. While the Prime Minister?s comments generate the hope that the government might be prepared to address the issue, the Home Minister?s comments last week that extrajudicial executions were not happening undermines that hope.
The end of the international photography exhibition Chobi Mela leads onto a two day Dhaka World Music festival – 4th and 5th February, 2011.
TIME : Friday 4th 3:pm – 11PM
Saturday 5th 3pm-11pm
Sultana Kamal Mohila Krira Complex. Dhanmondi
The first-ever Dhaka World Music Fest? ? February 4 ? 5, 2011, brings the eclectic grooves and hypnotic rhythms of Cuban-funk, Afro-beat, Baul, Reggae, Pala and Bangla-Latin fusion to your ears like never before.
The 2-day musical extravaganza features a plethora of world-class musicians from home and abroad. The month of February is eternal in the heart of each and every Bengali people and celebrating this auspicious month through the Universal language of music goes far beyond our geographic periphery since 21st February is celebrated as ?International Mother Language Day? across the world.
The Dhaka World Music Fest promises to be Dhaka?s official yearly international music hotspot, ushering in its new era as World Music hub. This will be the ultimate international musicfest experience to captivate all music-lovers.
The Bands
Dele Sosimi Band ? legendary Afro beat band from one of the originators of the Nigerian genre
Shahjahan Munshi ? Master musician who brings the blues to baul
Motimba ? fiery Cuban funk
Lalon band ? Bangla folk rock fusion at its best
Rob Fakir ? hypnotic contemporary Baul
Posted on?February 2, 2011 by?Chulie de Silva in Chobi Mela VI blog Three cheers for Chobi Mela, Participants at the last day of evening presentations at Goethe Institue 27 January, 2011. Photograph ??Mahabub Alam Khan/DrikNews
Dhaka, Bangladesh. February 2, 2011: Chobi Mela VI ? International Festival of Photography draws to a close on a high note after a two weeks long showcasing of creative talent in 29 print and 31 digital exhibitions. The last day to catch the exhibitions will be 3 February 2011 and they will be at the Bangladesh Shilpakala Academy, Alliance Francaise de Dhaka, The Asiatic Gallery of Fine Arts, The British Council, Drik Gallery, The Goethe-Institut and the Lichutola at Faculty of Fine Arts, University of Dhaka. Pathshala students and international visitors at the start of the festival. Photograph ? K M Asad ?The overwhelming sense of Chobi Mela VI in Dhaka, Bangladesh, in Asia at the beginning of what has been described as the Asian Century is one of potential. Huge creative potential, the potential to change the narrative of the global community, recast its mythologies and restate its essence,? says visitor Chris Riley from U.S.A.. ?From Dhaka the stories must be different; they must be from a different perspective and in a different form. This is the Chobi Mela challenge: to emerge into the world and change it.? ?The success of this festival is because of you. The practitioners who have walked the walk, and the audience who have nurtured and supported this crazy dream. It is a dream we will dream together, and triumph we shall? Shahidul Alam. Photograph ? D M Shibly
Dhaka?s young band of photographers is more than ready to take up the challenge. There outlook is fresh and the creativity of their work is impressive. The euphoria, the excitement among the young and the veterans was palpable. The old hands were free with their advice but the young were not averse to arguing and holding on to their positions. A comment by Chris Riley sums up the festival aptly. ?The brilliance of Chobi Mela persistently emerges as a near contact sport between the past and the future, old and young.? Shahidul Alam moderates a panel discussion on ?Are There Other Ways of Seeing?? about the cultural implications of visual grammar with Laurence Leblanc French artist and Dick Doughty, Managing Editor, Saudi Aramco World, U.S.A. Photograph ??Mahabub Alam Khan/DrikNews
Dr. Shahidul Alam, Festival Director recalls how people were incredulous when Drik decided to set up its own festival of photography, which would showcase the work of Bangladeshi artist alongside the most exciting work from the rest of the world. Against all odds the Chobi Mela festival has gone from strength to strength. ?If impossibility is a criterion for success, then Chobi Mela has all the credentials,? says Alam. Shahidul Alam and Pedro Meyer in conversation with John G Morris, the picture editor of the New York Times during the Vietnam war who joined the evening presentations at Goethe Institut on 22 January 2011. Morris in 1971, is the edotor who first published Nick Ut's picture of the young girl with burn injuries running from a Napalm attack. Photograph ? Saikat Mojumder/DrikNews
To achieve this success Drik additionally used new technologies to include a global audience by live broadcast on Drik TV ( www.drik.tv) the inauguration at the National Theatre Auditorium, Bangladesh Shilpakala Academy and the evening presentations at Goethe Institut from 21-27 January.
DHAKA, Bangladesh ? Any other year Muhammad Yunus, the Nobel Peace Prize laureate and a pioneer of microcredit, would be in Davos, Switzerland, this week. For years he has been celebrated at global gatherings like the World Economic Forum there for helping move millions of impoverished women toward a better life through tiny but transformational loans. ?Muhammad Yunus founded the microfinance institution Grameen Bank 34 years ago. ??Shahidul Alam/Drik/Majority World/ for The New York Times
Instead, he was in court again on Thursday, facing accusations, considered frivolous by most accounts, that one of his nonprofit companies adulterated vitamin-fortified yogurt. On Jan. 18, he was summoned to a rural courtroom to face charges of defamation lodged by a local politician.
Microcredit, the idea that Mr. Yunus popularized as a path out of penury for those long excluded from the banking system, has increasingly come under scrutiny. Scholars have cast doubt on its effectiveness in fighting poverty, and politicians and other critics accuse microfinanciers, many of whom, unlike Mr. Yunus, profit from the loans, of getting rich off the poor.
Now, the government of Bangladesh has ordered a wide-ranging inquiry into the microfinance institution he founded 34 years ago, Grameen Bank, after a Norwegian documentary accused him of mishandling donors? money. Norway?s government has said no money was misused. Still, Mr. Yunus?s troubles will deepen what has become a global crisis in microfinance that threatens to undermine the very concept ? small loans to poor people without collateral ? on which his reputation rests.
Long accustomed to adulation at home and abroad, suddenly, at 70, Mr. Yunus, Bangladesh?s best-known citizen, finds himself very much on the defensive. In an interview at his office here, Mr. Yunus seemed stunned and deeply stung.
?There is some kind of misinformation,? he said, his voice trailing off. ?I shouldn?t say more.?
A pause.
?Every word I say will be held against me,? he said finally.
On one level, his troubles seem to be largely political. Mr. Yunus, who leads a spartan life, has for decades floated well above the muck of Bangladeshi politics. Then in 2007, while a caretaker government backed by the military ruled Bangladesh, he waded in, egged on by supporters who argued that his leadership was needed in a time of crisis.
He declared in an interview that Bangladeshi politics were riddled with corruption. He floated a short-lived political party. Bangladesh?s political class did not take kindly to being lectured by the Nobel laureate. The steely leader of one of the main political parties, Sheikh Hasina Wazed, took umbrage, analysts say.
In the 2008 election that restored democracy after a two-year interregnum, Ms. Hasina led her party, the Awami League, back power with a vast majority. Her critics say that in lashing out at Mr. Yunus she is simply trying to eliminate a political rival.
But lost in the talk of politics is a more complex question: how to ensure that Grameen Bank, which has 8.3 million borrowers, has loaned $10 billion and has become an indispensable part of Bangladesh?s social and economic fabric, outlives its charismatic founder? Mr. Yunus is now a decade beyond the bank?s mandatory retirement age, and apparently there is no successor in sight.
Long-serving internal candidates that might have replaced Mr. Yunus as the bank?s managing director after his retirement have departed acrimoniously.
The government recently appointed one of his former deputies, Muzammel Huq, as chairman of the board. Mr. Huq has been a vocal critic of Mr. Yunus, and the promotion of a former underling has been taken as a sure sign that the government seeks to oust the bank?s founder.
?I think he is a good man with a small heart,? Mr. Huq said of Mr. Yunus. ?He cannot give credit to anyone but himself,? he added, with a wan smile at his pun.
Microfinance experts worry that a government takeover of Grameen Bank may turn it into a tool of political patronage and destroy it. Mr. Yunus said that he was eager to step down, but that the transition must be handled carefully to avoid panic among borrowers and the bank?s employees.
?I am riding the tiger,? Mr. Yunus said. ?I cannot just get off the tiger without drawing the attention of that tiger. So I have to very quietly do it.?
The Norwegian documentary accuses him of improperly moving $100 million that has been donated by Norway for microcredit to another Grameen nonprofit organization. The Norwegian government later confirmed that the money had been improperly moved, but it cleared Grameen of any wrongdoing. Continue reading “Microcredit Pioneer Faces an Inquiry in Bangladesh”
Because of its power and global interests U.S. leaders have committed crimes as a matter of course and structural necessity. A strict application of international law would … have given every U.S. president of the past 50 years Nuremberg treatment.
Edward S Herman, American professor of economics
The crimes of the U.S. throughout the world have been systematic, constant, clinical, remorseless, and fully documented but nobody talks about them.
Harold Pinter, English dramatist
WHEN I read of the US ambassador at-large for war crimes Stephen Rapp?s impending visit to Bangladesh, to offer advice to the government on how to try Bangladeshi war criminals of 1971, I was reminded of a personal experience more than a decade ago.
Jahangirnagar University, where I was teaching, was in turmoil. A thousand-plus students, mostly women, spilled out of classrooms to protest against campus rape. Demonstrations. Rallies. Sit-ins. ?We want an independent enquiry. Punish the rapist!? they chanted, as they pointed fingers at Jasimuddin Manik, general secretary of the Bangladesh Chhatra League, JU unit.
Two, maybe three days later, the Chhatra League, too, was out in full force. Led by Manik, I watched the procession wind its way along the corridors, march down brick-laden pathways. ?We want justice. Punish the rapist!?
It?s known as deceit.
One must admit, it was cleverly done. At the very outset of his press conference on January 13, Rapp spoke of his personal ?disappointment? in his ?own government?, in the ?highest [American] leadership during that period? when ?enormous crimes? had been committed, then quickly shifted, in the same breath, to expressing ?pride in the leadership? exercised by late Senator Edward Kennedy, and the role of Archer Blood, US Consul General in Dhaka, in providing ?accurate reports of the atrocities.? Implying, thereby, that one absolved the other.
No mention of Henry Kissinger, the then national security adviser, who is, in the words of investigative journalist Wayne Madsen, the ?most prominent unindicted war criminal roaming around today.? Kissinger had, in late April 1971, at the very height of mass murder?at least ten thousand civilians had been slaughtered in the first 3 days, the following 9 months had been marked by mass rape, genocide and dismemberment, the eventual civilian death toll put as high as 3 million?sent a message to Pakistan?s ruler General Yahya Khan, thanking him for his ?delicacy and tact? (Christopher Hitchens, The Trial of Henry Kissinger, 2002).
No mention of Archer Blood?s immediate recall from his post either, for having been the senior signatory to the April 6, 1971 cable from Dhaka. Nor, heaven forbid, of the fact that Blood reported not so much the genocide, as the US government?s ?complicity? in the genocide. ?Our government has failed to denounce the suppression of democracy. Our government has failed to denounce atrocities…[instead it has bent] over backwards to placate the West Pak[istan] dominated government…Our government has evidenced what many will consider moral bankrupt, ironically at a time when the USSR sent President Yahya Khan a message defending democracy… We, as professional civil servants, express our dissent with current policy and fervently hope that our true and lasting interests here can be defined and our policies redirected.? The US ambassador-at-large for war crimes issues, Stephen J Rapp: the US will help Bangladesh stage ?open and transparent? trials for crimes against humanity committed during 1971, press conference, Dhaka, January 13. ? Sanaul Haque/New Age
Nor any mention of the punishment meted out to the cable?s other signatories. The cable, ?the most public and the most strongly worded demarche from State Department servants to the State Department that has ever been recorded? was signed by 20 members of the US diplomatic team here and, by a further 9 senior officers in the South Asia division in Washington. Being a vengeful man, Kissinger ?downgraded? them after becoming the secretary of state in 1973. Continue reading “But what about US war crimes, Mr Ambassador-at-large?”
From the Exhibition Dhaka My Dreams, My Reality by Debashish Shom
To Debasish Shom, photography is the interpretation of a state of mind. He believes the physiological and emotional thoughts of the mind influence images greatly, and photographs act as a medium to unravel and express these thoughts.
A Bangladeshi photographer, Debasish Shom is a graduate from Pathshala South Asian Media Academy. Since childhood, Shom has always felt the need for a medium to aptly convey his emotions. When he graduated from university, he began taking interest in pictures and got admitted to Pathshala. Unlike many who have grown up with photographs, Shom?s first exposure of the art came through the institution.
Debashish Shom second from left at the special opening of four exhibitions at Drik 0n 23 January 2001. With him are (from Left to right) artist David de Souza, Chief Guest Kushi Kabir, Festival Director Shahidul Alam and artist Munem Wasif. Photograph Chulie de Silva
Soon, photographs and stories were beginning to take shape. His exhibition ?at Chobi Mela VI, ?Dhaka: My Dreams, My Reality? at the Drik Open Air Gallery is on till 3 February 2011.? It?embodies the psychosomatic war between his dreams and reality. He portrays how a person under the influence of drugs perceives his space in the bustling city of the rat race. There is a sense of isolation, illusion, depression and emptiness everywhere that largely contradicts what one knows Dhaka city to be.
?When I photograph, I always try to redefine my space. What is seen and experienced is reconstructed and a contradiction created. That is how I feel I am most involved with space and matter.?
From the exhibition Dhaka My Dreams, My Reality by Debashish Shom
The exhibit encapsulates complex struggles into simple photographs that strike the viewers almost instantaneously. They are powerful and potent, providing an?indiscreet?insight into undiscovered realities. To interpret the mind?s transition and turmoil is exciting and difficult at the same time, and Shom has rather effortlessly captured it in his frames.
Shom has held exhibitions at Drik Gallery Bangladesh and Kiyosato Museum of Arts in Japan. His work was also showcased in Chobi Mela IV. As a successful artist, would Shom recommend a career in photography to others?
?If someone is passionate, I believe a career can be built through photography. There is a lot of opportunity in commercial photography that can be approached alongside documentary photography. I only speak from my experiences, and I still believe I can make it as a photographer. However, it is important rethink carefully before making up one?s mind in this field. There is a lot of hard work involved.?
With the rampant growth of digital technology, the field of photography has become increasingly competitive over the past few years. There are more people taking pictures now.
?I think it?s great so many people are taking pictures. It makes them value pictures. Photographs then become significant in their lives and they can appreciate the art better.?
Debasish Shom currently works for CANVAS ? a fashion and lifestyle magazine.
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About Sabhanaz Rashid Diya
I’m a cranky, over-excited and lazy 18-year-old. I can suddenly “spark out” creativity and sleep non-stop for 12 hours. I also am frustrated (and in good moods, amused) by my own life. You can know more about me at 18forlife.wordpress.com View all posts by Sabhanaz Rashid Diya??
