Yunus greets Hindus on Janmashtami; promises to promote interfaith harmony in Bangladesh
Dhaka (PTI): Bangladesh's interim government chief Muhammad Yunus on Monday met the country’s Hindu community and vowed to promote interfaith harmony as he hosted a reception for them coinciding with Janmashtami.
The minority Hindu population has faced vandalisation of their business and properties and devastation of Hindu temples in the students’ violence that ensued for days following the ouster of prime minister Sheikh Hasina, who fled to India on August 5.
"There can't be any divisions among people in our country. We are equal citizens. The interim government is determined to protect the rights of every citizen of the country," the chief adviser’s (CA) office quoted Yunus as saying.
According to the statement, Yunus expected to build Bangladesh “where everyone can practice their faith without any fear and where no temple needs to be guarded”.
“Bangladesh is a large family where the responsibility of the government is to protect the rights of every citizen,” his office quoted him as saying on X.
Bangladesh Puja Udjapan Parishad president Bashudeb Dhar, Ramkrishna Mission of Dhaka’s principal Swami Purnatmananda Maharaj, and Hindu community leaders including Kajol Debnath and Monindra Kumar Nath were present during the meeting.
“We spoke with Professor Yunus for almost an hour and he said all Bangladeshis are members of a single family. We will eliminate any sense of communalism,” Dhar told PTI.
Yunus greeted the country’s Hindu community leaders and promised to promote interfaith harmony, the statement said.
The CA office statement said the Hindu leaders greeted Yunus on the auspicious occasion, saying they sought blessings of the Lord Sri Krishna for the harmony and prosperity of the nation and the interim government.
“Hindu leaders praised the Chief Adviser's recent comments at the Dhakeshwari Mandir, a sacred temple in Old Dhaka, saying it would help build a non-communal society in the country and ensure religious harmony in the society,” the statement read.
Simultaneously, they raised the issue of “Hindu property grabbing, including the land of Hindu temples”.
The reception came as tens of thousands of Hindus celebrated Janmashtami by rallying at the famous Dhakeshwari Temple and other temples and Hindu monasteries by singing Vedic hymns, kirtans and bhajans.
Janmashtami is a public holiday in Bangladesh to mark the birth celebration of Lord Krishna.
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Pakistan reports two more polio cases; Total tally now 52
ISLAMABAD: At least two more cases of poliovirus were reported in Pakistan, taking the number of infections to 52 so far this year, a report said on Friday.
“The Regional Reference Laboratory for Polio Eradication at the National Institute of Health has confirmed the detection of two more wild poliovirus type 1 (WPV1) cases in Pakistan," an official statement said.
The fresh infections — a boy and a girl — were reported from the Dera Ismail Khan district of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province.
“Genetic sequencing of the samples collected from the children is underway," the statement read. Dera Ismail Khan, one of the seven polio-endemic districts of southern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, has reported five polio cases so far this year.
Of the 52 cases in the country this year, 24 are from Balochistan, 13 from Sindh, 13 from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, and one each from Punjab and Islamabad.
There is no cure for polio. Only multiple doses of the oral polio vaccine and completion of the routine vaccination schedule for all children under the age of five can keep them protected.
