What makes the Dinajpuri character?
Initial observation: Deep night as the bus from Dhaka crossed Dinajpur District border. A few minutes later a woman needed to get down. It spurred discussion among the conductor and fellow passengers. Was she sure? Was it okay to leave a woman alone on a dark road?
She repeated the place name. It was right. She got out.
The bus moved forward. The bus stopped. The bus reversed. No, it couldn't be done. She was delivered to the safety of a late night barber's shop. And I wondered…
I'm not alone in anticipating that considerate temperament from people of the country's northwest. Simply mentioning Dinajpur is a kind of character reference.
This writer was determined to discover: What makes the Dinajpuri?
Observation: In Dinajpur town no rickshaw driver asked for more than the exact fare; one can't say that of all regional centres. Twice I was unexpectedly called back. “You paid too much,” rickshaw drivers said. It has hardly happened elsewhere…
I asked The Daily Star correspondent Kongkon Karmaker his opinion; and he himself exhibits the admirable qualities one might associate with Dinajpur, albeit there's a bit of Borishailla in his blood.
He spoke of Hindu families preparing vermicelli for Muslims' Eid-ul-Fitr; of Muslims included in Durga Puja committees, with some performing aroti dance in front of Durga Ma's pandal. The town's prominent temples confirm religious tolerance.
“Dinajpur has one of the highest percentages of Hindus nationwide,” Karmaker says, “Disharmony is rare.” The district is also diverse with ethnic minorities, principally the Santhals.
Perhaps in the villages was more to learn.
At Mahadeppur village in Biral upazilla, at a nameless shop in the row called Bashudev Supermarket, proprietor Sanatan Chandra Roy agrees, “People are good here. There's no conflict between Hindus and Muslims. Why I don't know. It just is so.”
“What's in Biral?” proposes a customer. “Everything is here: betel, cigarettes and tea.”
History agrees. The Dinajpur District Census Report of 1961 observed that Dinajpuris are “nostalgic to a degree, and unless they are very hard pressed they do not leave their homes.”
“Few experience the pangs of hunger as our own countrymen do,” wrote a Briton, Major Sherwill, about Dinajpur in 1860, “They may wholly abstain from labour for weeks or even months and still manage to feed and clothe themselves and their families. Their wants are few.”
According to the Gazetteer land has been more plentiful and population density less than other regions. Have these factors influenced an easygoing attitude?
“There is no district in Bangladesh as thanda [cool] as Dinajpur,” says Md Fazlul Haque at the Nurul Mudir tea shop in Biral'sTaiabpur. The upazilla administration officer spent years in Khulna, which he liked, but “Dinajpur's people are best.”
“People are occupied with their own business,” he says, “Nobody intends to harm someone. We don't like conflict.”
“At any Puja pandal,” interjects shopkeeper Mozammel Haque, “for every four Hindus must be eight Muslims. Everyone enjoys. We are one.”
“The land is good,” he reflects, “That's why people are gentle.”
“People are not much desperate so we don't quarrel,” suggests farmer Sri Manmohan Chandra Roy of Andharmucha in Chirirbandar upazilla.
Observation: Evening on a narrow town road and there's overpowering music blasting from a red-light flashing amplifier, street-side. “Inconsiderate,” is a first thought, but then I notice the street's other side: the long wall of Dinajpurgaol. Perhaps somewhere inside a prisoner was smiling from hearing the distant rhythms of their favourite Bollywood and Bangla dance numbers? Perhaps a birthday, knowing they weren't forgotten? It takes volume to conquer concrete.
Yet the Gazetteer mentions mass migration into Dinajpur, especially during Partition's upheaval. It lists famines. And news out of Dinajpur over the past several months is peppered with instances of violence. Surely such facts remind: every rule has exceptions.
Because regardless, in Dinajpur you'll find it: that helpful, sincere majority – a little more tolerant perhaps, a little more peaceful perhaps… Exactly why, I'm unsure.
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