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16 FRIDAY, DECEMBER 23, 2016 DT Feature The uncomfortable issue of ‘comfort women’ • Mahmood Sadi The issue of comfort women during the Pacific Theater of World War II is not something that is well depicted in the media for the common people. Perhaps, this fact alone will shed light on the rarity of available media content about comfort women that it took Cho-Jung Rae, a South Korean film director 14 years and the contributions of 75,000 individual donors to put the issue of ‘comfort women’ into the silver screen for the first time on a large scale. His movie Spirits’ Homecoming, released in 2016, was about two fictional Korean girls (though based on real facts), Jung-Min (14) and Young-hee (15) who were kidnapped by the Japanese Imperial Army and taken to a ‘Comfort Station’ in China. The term ‘comfort women’ is a controversial term that refers to approximately 200,000 women who were recruited as prostitutes by the Imperial Japanese Army during World War II. Many of the young women were forced into servitude and exploited as sex slaves throughout Asia, becoming victims of the largest case of human trafficking in the 20th century. A New York Times report said that the idea of comfort women first came from a lieutenant paymaster in Japan’s Imperial Navy named Yasuhiro Nakasone, who was stationed at Balikpapan on the island of Borneo. There, he was assigned to oversee the construction of an airfield. But he found that sexual misconduct, gambling and fighting were so prevalent among his men that the work was stalled. As a solution, Nakasone organised a military brothel, or ‘comfort station’. After the success of his venture, the same idea was replicated by thousands of Imperial Japanese Army and Navy officers across the Indo-Pacific, both before and during World War II, as a matter of policy. From Nauru to Vietnam, from Burma to Timor, women were treated as the first reward of conquest. So, by definition, the trade of comfort women is thus a massive violation of human rights. Interestingly, countries like Korea, China, Taiwan which have suffered most by the Imperial Japanese Army on the issue of comfort women have left out Photos: AP this issue from their textbooks, leaving the individuals embroiled in the atrocious practice to be remembered merely as abstract characters in a taboo history. On 1993, Japan’s Chief Cabinet Secretary Kōno Yōhei issued an official declaration on comfort women which conclusively said, referring to a Japanese government study, that in many cases, the comfort women were recruited against their own will, through coaxing coercion, etc, and that, at times, administrative/ military personnel directly took part in the recruitments. They lived in misery at comfort stations under a coercive atmosphere. Interestingly, at present, the Japanese military’s involvement in comfort stations is bitterly contested. The Japanese government led by Shinzo Abe denies that imperial Japan ran a system of human trafficking and coerced prostitution, implying that comfort women were simply camp-following prostitutes. The official narrative in Japan is fast becoming detached from reality, as it seeks to cast the Japanese people, rather than the comfort women of the Asia-Pacific theater, as the victims of this story. The Abe administration sees this historical revision as integral to restoring Japan’s imperial wartime honour and modern-day national pride. But the broader effect of the campaign has been to cause Japan to back away from international efforts against human rights abuses and to weaken its desire to be seen as a responsible partner in prosecuting possible war crimes. Academicians however argue that the history of the comfort women is not (as some commentators in both countries wish to portray it) an issue of Japanese-versus-Koreans. It is an issue of human rights and human dignity whose implications extend throughout East Asia and beyond. •
Feature 17 FRIDAY, DECEMBER 23, 2016 DT Discovering our heritage – Puthia • Nahin Taher History and its beauty, diminishes with the fall of its place and time. Once an edifice, which has paved its way to be marked as a heritage, falls, it is simply because it lacks proper maintenance by the government. A heritage tells us about its origin; about our origin. But, unfortunately we neglect our past and see it decline with time, eradicating indiscriminately like its origin. One such land that lost all is Puthia. Puthia is an upazila in Rajshahi district. From Puthia to Rajshahi, the distance is about 30km. Puthia can be easily located as it is beside the Dhaka-Rajshahi highway. In its initial days, it was a village of Laskarpur Pargana, named after Laskar Khan. Puthia can be accessed by a side road off the main street, where the temple complex of Puthia lies, with its splendid and aristocratic late 19th century palace, and some of the finest Hindu temples within the country. The Rajbari of Puthia is surrounded by many lakes, which act as boundaries and covers 4.31 acres of land. The Rajbari was once surrounded by strong walls, but the remains of it has been damaged in various places now. The palace is divided into four courts: Kachari (office) Angan (court), Mandir angan or Gobindabari (temple court), Andar Mahal (inner quarters) and Residence of Maharani Hemanti Kumari. Each room of the Rajbari is built around the courts in the palace, with the exception of the kachari angan. The courts of the palace are one storey high. The west entrance gate of the palace leads to kachari angan, while the other leads to the Temple or Gobindabari courts. Each portico is supported by four semi-Corinthian columns, which are as tall as the full height of the building. The upper part of the building is also supported by four semi Corinthian pillars. On the east side of the Rajbari, there is a wooden staircase, which leads to the upper floor. There are three rooms of different sizes and out of these three, two were used as treasure vaults. In the west, there are four rooms with two protruding verandas. Close to Gobindabari, there are two small rooms with a veranda. Sadly, most of the rooms built on the eastern and southern sides of kachari angan are at ruins. The northern wing of the building has two floors. The upper floor has six large rooms. In the hallway of the Rajbari, there is a wide veranda with two balconies on either sides. At the centre of the Rajbari, there is the Pancharatna Bara Gobinda temple, which is beautifully ornamented with terracotta. In the western part of the Rajbari, there are two rooms with several toilets. This lies mainly in the Ander Mahal of the Rajbari. The western wing, which is mainly the Andar Mahal, is impoverished. The eastern part of Ander Mahal, where Rani Hermanta Kumari lived, is one storey. It has a porch in front, along with a central reception hall, with nine big rooms. The wide verandas have arches in the front and the back. Most of the roofs are made out of iron and wood. Most of the terracotta relics of the temples that surround the palace in Puthia, such as the Chotto Anik Temple, Boro Gobindo Temple and Chotto Gobindo Temple, have been either stolen or destroyed. The others are at grave risk, as those are almost at the brink of decaying, due to high salinity. Sheer carelessness and lack of responsibility of the government and the Department of Archaeology and History, is pushing this exquisite site to lose its existence completely. Till now, there has not been any effective initiative taken by them to preserve the palace and its surrounding temples. During the last 30 years, the failure of the Department and was evident, when they couldn’t even put up a mere boundary wall in place for the protection of the temple and the palace. Relics, terracotta motifs and artefacts are being looted every other day. This 400 year-old edifice is now a common site for cattle grazing. The government has not declared the importance of Puthia’s heritage to tourism till date. The beautiful palace, which once stood with pride because of it terracotta motifs, is diminishing with time. Most of the terracotta motifs are stolen due to absence of proper preservation and care from the Department of Archaeology and History. • Photos: Syed Zakir Hossain
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