ED: Spreading the right message

It is heartening to see the fulfilment of one of the government’s campaign pledges -- Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has inaugurated 50 mosques across the nation as part of the initiative to set up centres of religious excellence in every single district and upazila.

While no amount of time will allow us to forget the horrors of the Holey Artisan attack in 2016, forgetting not something we should strive for in the first place -- the incident must be remembered in order to ensure that such acts of extremism never again take place in our nation, and that we pro-actively implement policies which ensure the elimination of such extremist thinking and militancy from Bangladesh.

It is in the context of this that the inauguration of these mosques -- with the plan being to set up 560 in total -- is an encouraging sign of the government’s plan to treat the disease of extremism at its root, by spreading Islamic fraternity, focusing on Islam’s true message of peace and harmony amongst all human beings, conducting research, and creating strong infrastructure. These mosques will provide the people, especially the youth of this nation, with a place of worship as well as learning.

Oftentimes, mosques have been run by preachers who did not have the best interest of the people and this nation at heart, instead turning these places of peace and worship into hotbeds for extremist activity, spreading falsities regarding the religion of peace.

This current, highly ambitious initiative will go a long way towards ensuring that communities across the nation are provided with the right message, and an opportunity to learn and truly understand the tenets of tolerance and humanity that Islam stands for.