We came to know from various news sources that the government has instructed all the educational institutions, functioning under the secondary and higher secondary education department, to observe Bangla Noboborsho along with the Mongol shovajatra on Pahela Boishakh (The first day of the Bengali calendar). Expressing wonder at this government’s move, Bangladesh Jamaat-e-Islami’s Nayeb-e-Ameer and former lawmaker Professor Mujibur Rahman has issued the statement on 30th March, 2017 saying that, the government cannot impose the decision of observing Bangla Noboborsho along with the Mongol shovajatra on Pahela Boishakh in this country, where 90 percent of the total populations are Muslim. The constitution contains the sentence like ‘Bismillahir Rahmanir Rahim’ (In the name of Allah, the most beneficial, the most gracious) and still the state religion of this country is Islam. In such a nation, imposition of such decision is anti-constitution and unlawful. The people want to know to satisfy whom, the government has taken such a controversial decision?

Charukala Institute of Dhaka University has launched the tradition of Mongol Shovajatra on Pahela Boishakh in 1989. Islam never approves this procession as in this procession, participants put the masks of dolls, elephants, dragons, horses and other animals on their faces and dance and cross the streets with dancing with their partners. The Islamic scholars of the country also opined that Mongol Shovajatra is not allowed in Islam. It does not match with the Muslim culture. It is a cultural aggression. It is not justified to impose the rituals of one religion upon the practitioners of other religion. It is the characteristic of the tyrannical government to impose the rituals and cultures of one religion upon the practitioners of other religion.

Almighty Allah is the sole controller and authority of all kinds of welfares. Allah also describes in the Quran, how we can seek mercy and welfare. Luck and fate is completely fixed and determined by the Almighty Allah, which is also described in various parts of the holy Quran. In particular, Almighty Allah has revealed Sura Qadr only for the guideline of the human beings in this regard. Allah also instructed the Muslims to search Lailatul Qadr (the Night of Qadr) in the odd nights of the last 10 days of the holy month of Ramadan seeking the welfare for the individual as well as for the nation. Besides, the Muslims are saying their prayers 5 times a day and after the prayer they also pray to Almighty Allah seeking blessings. Denouncing the decrees of the holy Quran, if the blessings are sought through Mongol Shovajatra, that can never ensure mass welfare, rather it destroys the moral and ethical characters of the youth communities. We must have to protest against the conspiracy of destroying our tradition, education and culture.

In this backdrop, I am urging the countrymen, particularly the religious scholars and the Islamic leaders to raise their voice against the move of imposing harmful foreign cultural aggression in the name of Mongol Shovajatra on Pahela Boishakh.