BDR

I was scheduled to return to Dhaka last February when the Bangladesh Rifles (BDR) mutiny broke out (the BDR are the paramilitary border security force). I was deluged with emails, phone calls and SMS advising me not to go to Dhaka. I arrived one week after the event and there was still a palpable buzz around the campus, with crowds still gathering around the entrance to the BDR cantonment at the top of Satmasjid Rd, next door to Rifle Square, the premier middle class shopping mall in Dhanmondi.

One of the reasons my colleagues were still agitated about the mutiny was the fact that much of it was played out just outside the university itself. Faculty and students had to be evacuated from the premises by a convoluted route because they were in danger from the bullets whizzing straight down Satmasjid. A student was killed just outside the building (fortunately not one of ours) and there were bullet holes in nearby buildings. Things had calmed down by my return but the mutiny was a reminder of how volatile Dhaka can be. The Australian High Commission frequently sends out reminders to Australians resident in Bangladesh about the volatility and how demonstrations should be avoided.

By this time I had given up my/our lovely apartment on Road 12A and was staying at the very pleasant guesthouse called Ambrosia. I met Philip Blenkinsop, the well known Australian photojournalist resident in Bangkok, there who has covered most Asian conflicts of the past 20 years. Philip made the point that in his experience whenever bullets began to fly people fled or took cover. This was not the case in Dhanmondi. In a sense the the mutiny became street theatre and attracted a huge crowd, who formed a fan around the entrance to the barracks, leaving sufficient room for the bullets to fly down Satmasjid Rd. The troops called in to suppress the mutiny then had to negotiate their way through the crowds. In Philip's view it was astounding that more people were not killed.

The mutiny was put down and large numbers of BDR sepoys arrested. Subsequently a number of these have 'died' whilst in custody, which is a scandal in the making. The reasons given for the mutiny are confused. There is no doubt that there were flaws in the chain of command and the troops had genuine grievances but beyond that it is murky. One popular interpretation is that external forces (India or Pakistan - take your pick) engineered the event to destabilise the new Awami League government.

This view has been given some credibility with the announcement from the new commander of the BDR saying that 'foreign enemies got benefited' by the event (today's lead story in The Daily Starr). I have friends who are convinced that India is planning to takeover Bangladesh and others that the ISI, Pakistan's notorious intelligence agency routinely sets out to de-stabilise the country as a pay back for 1971. When you point out the unlikelihood of these interpretations you are dismissed. From my perspective the idea that India wishes to add 160 million Muslims to its citizenry verges on the preposterous.

But then the question remains - why did the BDR mutiny? Well there is a tradition of military revolt in Bangladesh. The army has assumed power twice in the past 38 years and there is general acceptance that the army underpinned the Interim Government, 2007 - 2008. May be the explanation is as banal as that - they were acting according to local traditions to solve grievances. But which ever way you look at it Bangladesh has been left with a pretty serious problem to solve - what do you do with a security force you can't trust?