Dr Iftekhar Iqbal, a professor at Universiti Brunei Darussalam, has said the ‘reconstruction’ of Bengal delta history is needed to break some misconceptions in line with the aspirations of the recent revolution.

“We need ‘reconstruction’ of history (to break some misconceptions) as we’ve already been in the stage of Meta (massive) reform to implement the aspirations of the revolution,” he said while delivering a lecture on Monday.    

The lecture titled “Reconstruction of Bengal Delta History: Some Directions,” was arranged as part of the political speech series-1 of the Jatiya Nagorik Committee in the city.

Prof Iqbal mentioned some misconceptions saying that there are narratives that Bengali Muslims face an identity crisis, they were invaders here, a communal tendency is there among them, and Bengal was a rural society. But these narratives are not true, he said.

“Bengali Muslims have an identity crisis, which is still a dominating narrative in our intellectual space. …. But I don’t see any crisis of identity here,” he said.

He said the Muslims of Bangladesh had agreed to join Assam in the past, then both Muslims and non-Muslims of this land agreed to remain united with West Bengal in 1946 and accepted to stay with (West) Pakistan.

Prof Iabal said there is no problem regarding the identity of Bengali Muslims rather they are very flexible.

About the arrival of Muslims here, he said Muslims had come here through Chattogram 200-300 years before the political arrival of Brahmans here.  “So, there is no use of the narrative that Muslims are arrivals or outsiders here,” he said. 

Replying to a question, Prof Iqbal opined for keeping only ‘democracy’ in the constitution, dropping ‘State religion Islam’ and ‘secularism’ from it.

“I personally think if you keep only ‘democracy’ in it, dropping everything (‘State religion Islam’ and secularism), it will be better. Nothing else required... I think we should stay simple,” he said.

Joint Convener of Jatiya Nagorik Committee Sarwar Tushar and its spokesperson Samanta Shermeen, among others, spoke at the event.