SPIRITUAL UPLIFT IN BANGLADESH AMONG THE POOR AND THE OPPRESSED

 

 

SPIRITUAL UPLIFT IN BANGLADESH

AMONG THE POOR AND THE OPPRESSED

IN THE MIDST OF IMMENSE DIFFICULTY

 

Sabyasachi Ghosh Dastidar

March 19, 2022

Dear Friends:

1990s Shrine after Attack

            On March 19, 2022, the important day of my son’s birthday, I got a thrilling call from the dirt-poor monk of Mahilara Mott ashram telling me that "I have never seen such a sea of humanity with thousands and thousands of people during our Shiv Ratri festivities (two weeks ago), of Lord Shiva. People came from all over, then toured the newly built Mita Banerjee School offering water and durba grass at Shiva Shrine (a traditional way of showing respect.) This was unbelievable, so I called you. I still can’t believe my eyes." The monk is so poor that he had to call from a paid telephone booth, having no access to cell phone with free web connections.

 

Bhumi Puja or Foundation Laying Ceremony of Nihar Kana Shelter for the Poor & School

 For us this is unbelievable too. We first thought of the project in 1990s when the 350-yeat old beautiful temple came under attack during 1990 and 1992 pogroms.

In 1996 ten individuals  - Bangladeshi, Bangladeshi-Indian-Hindu-Refugee-Indian-Americans, Bangladeshi-American, American - and one group came to help whose names are inscribed on a tablet, and that became our model for helping the poor, the orphaned, and the very poor.

Opening Ceremony in the Summer of 2001: Swagatam or Welcome

 This is the place where we have built Nihar Kana Bhaktabash O Bidyaloi, NIhar Kana Shelter for Devotees and School, and where we just opened Mita Banerjee School. Mita Banerjee is a Bangladeshi-Indian-American-Hindu-Refugee-American and Nihar Kana is the name of my mother and mother-in-law, who had to leave their ancestral homes during pogroms.

Shiva Deity 

Memorial of Dr. Sankar Ghosh Dastidar

We brought back Ma, Nihar Kana, and Dada, Older Brother, Sankar, back to their homeland. This is where the Shiv statue sits on Ma's ashes on the first-floor roof, and at the ground floor is Dada's memorial on top of his ashes where devotees offered prayer as well. 

                                                             Mita Banerjee School

 A short video sent by a local resident:

Immediately after opening in 2001 summer, the mott (hermitage) came under attack when a new government came to power. To protest Dastidar family flew/traveled to Gour Nodi Circuit House in Barisal District to meet with the winning parliamentarian who drove the monk out of the shrine, and didn't allow any minority to vote. He said it won't happen again. Then I met at the U.S. Embassy in Dhaka to protest their false reporting. They said they will report correctly.

Sadhu's call completed a full circle of believing in work, as we merged with ISPaD, The Indian Subcontinent Partition Documentation Project. We thank Mita again in helping the poor.  Transformation of the place we never dreamed of. 

Here are two links to Probini's first developmental project. 

http://empireslastcasualty.blogspot.com/2021/12/mita-banerjee-school-at-mahilara-mott.html

https://empireslastcasualty.blogspot.com/2019/01/mahilara-gour-nodi-barisal-bangladesh.html

Two weeks ago, ISPaD: Indian Subcontinent Partition Documentation, which has merged with Probini Foundation, approved funding for a new hostel at Aizawl, Mizoram State, India.

Swapna, PrabalDa, and Mita were extremely helpful in sending funds to Mahilara, and during 2021 Durga Puja pogrom when many sent relief to the victims.

Mahilara Mott is now included in a book by UNESCO, and their visitor’s book includes names of many important individuals including ambassadors from America, Europe, Africa, and Asia.

Mahilara Mott after Repair

OM Shanti! OM Peace!

Happy St. Patrick's Day, 2022.

 

 

 

 

Mita Banerjee School at Mahilara Mott Temple in Bangladesh

 

The Mita Banerjee School 

at 350-Year Old Mahilara Mott Temple in Bangladesh

Dr. Sachi G. Dastidar, New York

Mahilara Mott (Shrine) After Restoration

Since childhood my highly educated parents never gave up hope although they became homeless from our centuries-old ancestral home for a shelter in Kolkata, India. They had to flee from our homeland that became Pakistan, and later Bangladesh, where they weren’t allowed to return. They taught us to work hard, be honest and to keep faith in oneself. In their spiritual mind they expected results to follow. We weren’t raised religious. And at times they said “Do your work expecting the best result,” and used a common yet ancient Bengali (Sanskrit) proverb, “Ma Faleshu Kadachan..” Locally it meant “Don’t wait for the result.” Decades later my American friends told me that words came from the Holy Bhagabat Gita when Lord Arjun didn’t want to fight the devil as it will destroy some lives hurting his own feelings. Lord Krishna, Arjun’s chariot driver, then said those words to remind one to follow one’s duty or responsibility irrespective of the result. It is not that different from what our militaries and police are taught, or a parent teaches to their kids expecting the best result. (In traditional Hindu societies reading scriptures are not practiced unlike Christians, Muslims, Buddhists, Jews and other institutional religions.)

 Mahilara Mott (Shrine) Before Repair

 So, unknowingly our family got involved in preserving a 350-year old Hindu shrine in Muslim-majority Bangladesh that came under attack in 1990 and 1992 when the new believers wanted to destroy their pre-conversion heritage. We didn’t know how our effort will end. Very, very poor Bangla indigenous Hindu natives sought our help. At first I wanted to repair the structure, but wasn’t allowed to do so. Then I wrote dozens of letters from the lowest to the highest authorities. Finally, I was officially informed in 1996 by the Bangladesh Government that “your temple will be repaired.” I was overjoyed so were the entire village, Hindu and Muslim, and other poor-yet-highest-quality Hindus, if I can use the expression, hundred times better than me. After the Government’s decision as I entered the temple area surprising the highest quality Hindu poor Matua group, they started chanting and dancing, “Bhagaban, Our Beloved God, has landed in Martya, the Earth.” I joined them. 

Welcome by Very High Quality Hindus

 Although the beautiful structure was being repaired the locals residing at the Mott ashram barely had a roof over them. My family decided to help build a school for the poor and a shelter for the resident monk, a dirt poor hermit Rakhal Sadhu (bare chested at center, at top picture), and his mother (in white sari).

A Historic Day in the Subcontinent: Bhumi-Puja Foundation Laying of Nihar Kana Home of Devotees & School in Muslim-majority Bangladesh

 Swagatam – Welcome: The Dedication Ceremony in 2001 Summer

 To my family’s pleasant surprise several other families – American, Bangladeshi, Bangladeshi-Indian-Hindu-refugee – came together donating funds to build Nihar Kana (Bhaktabash O Bidyaloi) Home of Devotees and School in a distant, poor, rural area of southern coastal Bangladesh. Nihar-Kana being the name of my mother and mother-in-law, same name, who visited the historic shrine before Partition of Bengal and India in 1947, then became homeless refugees from their 15^th Century neighboring homes. Mother-in-law died after partition leaving her family to be headed by an early-teen daughter, when my wife Shefali was a toddler.

Nihar Kana Bhaktabash: Donors – Dr. Shefali Sengupta Dastidar, Miss Joyeeta GhoshDastidar, Master Shuvo GhoshDastidar, In Memory of the Late Rajlaskhmi Mitra (of Pirojpur) by son Sushen, In Memory of the Late Sudha Sengupta by son Ashish, Dr. Kusumita Priscilla Pedersen, In Memory of the Late Anil Kumar Majumdar by son Chitta Ranjan, In Memory of the Late Dhirendra Kumar Saha by son Bidhu Bhusan, Sri (Mr.) Anjan Haldar, In Memory of the Late K. B. RoyChowdhury by daughter Ruma, Srimad Bhagabat Gita Sangha of New York (U.S.A.), Dr. Sabyasachi Ghosh Dastidar; Dated – 24 Poush 1407 (2001 Summer)

The building was dedicated in the summer of 2001 attended by many of us.

In the Fall of 2021 soon after our 9/11 attack a pro-Islamist party came to power in Bangladesh with the pride of 9/11 destruction. There were attacks on Hindu minorities and many of their shrines. No Hindu minority was allowed to vote in our area, but there was no physical damage on the newly built structure. (To protest oppression this writer met with the winning Member of Bangladesh Parliament from the area at Gour Nodi Circuit House in the presence of hundreds of his followers. To protest this writer also met top officials of American Embassy in Dhaka which gave incorrect oppression report. Both apologized.)

The shrine became home to my mother Nihar Kana, and my oldest brother Sankar, a doctor in India serving poor Hindu refugees and tribes, after their passing. As is the tradition, their ashes were brought home to Bangladesh which they loved dearly.

 

Nihar Kana Ghosh Memorial

 Return of Dr. Sankar Ghosh Dastidar to His Homeland

After restoration of Mahilara Mott, the temple was included in a UNICEF book of Historic Hindu Temples of Bangladesh.

 

 Book Cover

 

 Inside Pages

  Since 2001, my entire family visited the shrine and the area a dozen times, including my oldest sister and her extended family; the last time being in pre-Covid 2019. The Mott temple’s visitor book now include names of many dignitaries, visitors, including many Ambassadors posted in Bangladesh.

 Recently a Probini Foundation friend Mita Banerjee, a Bangladeshi-Indian-Refugee-American retired from work and donated funds to the ashram. Probini was planning to build the second floor for a new school of the Bhaktabash building, and the timing couldn’t be better. A heavenly power must have been directing Mita and the Monk. Without seeing each other they came together in spirit. The second floor was completed in the midst of Covid lockdown, creating jobs for poor villagers who were eagerly looking for any job. What was more heavenly coincidence was that we soon learned that the Monk Dayamoi Sadhu of the ashram was ordained by Swami Nigamananda Ashram, a noted Hindu Order of philosopher and preacher of pacifism, and donor Mita Banerjee took her Diksha or Oath at a Nigamandaanda Ashram. Let us figure out the probability of such a coincidence[SD1] . Or, was it Heavenly Power that brought them together?

 Here is a picture of the newly built classroom of the mott (shrine) ashram, followed by a brief video sent to us by Chayan.  The school is free and admits kids of all religions and background.  

 Newly Opened Mita Banerjee School Looking at the Shrine

 

Mita Banerjee School Video, November 2021

        Thus my parents’ belief of “Ma Faleshu Kadachan” bore real results that neither could I believe nor could I predict. Long live the Mott, the School, the Monk Sadhu, the Villagers, and Mita Debi! Long live Jiban Maharaj, another hermit, who was a big help, and without his selfless leadership the school wouldn’t have come to fruition! 

           The new school was dedicated on Jhulan Purnima (Full Moon of Jhulan festivity), August 22, 2021.

For more information on Mahilara Mott and School, please check: https://empireslastcasualty.blogspot.com/2019/01/mahilara-gour-nodi-barisal-bangladesh.html

 

https://empireslastcasualty.blogspot.com/2008/12/educating-poor-and-orphaned-in.html

 

Comments from Social Media:

Sujata Dastidar

Great Sabya

 

Shuvo Dastidar

BEYOND IMPRESSIVE...an architectural feat!!! The statement is legitimate in any location, irrespective of the construction, political, religious hurdles this building process may have had to overcome - anywhere.

 

 Shri Sinha

soaring achievement.

Congratulations

 

---

 [SD1]