Masood Imran, PhD
Professor & Course teacher
e-mail: masood.imran@northsouth.edu
3
§ In the Raynagar Union, according to the 2011 census, there is a total population of 33,260, of
which Muslims are 32,697 and Hindus are 563. However, in the area studied, there was not a
single Hindu resident. In Bangladesh, a very common understanding about social
stratifications is that Hindu and Muslim people follow almost the same social structure.
However, this speculation was strongly nullified by James Wise (1894, cited in Arefeen, 1975),
who has shown in his very famous work that similar to the Hindu caste system, the Muslim
‘caste’ is free from ritual sanctions. This argument is vividly supported by Gait’s (1901,
cited in Arefeen, 1975: 62) Census Reports where he drew up a detail social structure of
Muslims of ‘Easten Bengal’. Gait identified three major group among the Muslims of Bengal: 1)
Ashraf or better class Muhammadans; 2) Ajlaf or lower class Muhammadans and 3) Arzal or
degraded classes. Ashraf belongs to Said, Shekh, Pathan, and Mughal. Ajlaf and arzal are
occupational groups. Being free from ritual sanctions caused to minimise the differences
among social classes and made exogamy easy. This system is not very rigid like the Hindu
caste system.
§ In the area studied, almost all people belonged to the Ajlaf or Arzal class. Locally,
another phenomenon, the gusti tradition, has been practiced since long before (Lewis,
D. & Hossain, 2008: 72). Within a village, different families jointly compose the gusti. It is
a spatial lineage group. In forming this group, a sense of social security is insisted on.
Disadvantaged people usually look to enjoy this patronal relationship. In a community
and social relations perspective, in the social life of rural Bangladesh, clientelism is a
key feature. Have and have-not are basic in order to practice this patron-client
relationship. The research area is a pastoral society where the landless or the microunit of a landowner’s farmers, have remained exploited due to land tenure or money
lending by the landowner or businesspersons.
§ Another phenomenon is the concept of samaj, which is a self-identification of the
spatial residential community. In the dictionary, the English synonym of samaj is
‘society’ but the essence of ‘society’ and the spatial location of samaj in Bangladesh is
quite different. Bertocci (2001, cited in Lewis, D. & Hossain, 2008: 72) identified this
samaj as a social institution which is detached from the local government. Bertocci
(2001, cited in Lewis, D. & Hossain, 2008: 72) states that “the samaj provides a
framework for moral order in which followers may have means of redress if leaders are
seen to behave in ways which offend norms of justice and morality”.
§ Bode (2002) mentioned another patron group, the Mosque and Temple committees, which
are most influential in the spatial pattern of rural society. Due to the spatial community of the
research area, a further group called the Mazar committee becomes relevant. Here, the
Mosque and Mazar committee are the same dominating group. Informal samaj leaders and
formal political leaders/governmental institution’s representative organise several public
activities (orose, jama’at and zakat) to improve their reputation. This committee of Shah
Sultan Balkhia’s Mazar, the agentive actor in the community, controls the local people’s
informal legislative and disciplinary behaviour in the context of moral/ethical justice. It is a
socially approved code of conduct, involving patronage, assistance or charity, which helps
govern the client community's everyday social interactions among the various social groups.
8