Farhad Mazhar

Biography

He graduated with honours in pharmacy from the University of Dhaka in 1967 and worked as a pharmacist in New York in the seventies and eighties. Mazhar also studied political economy in New School of Social Research. He is the founding member and managing director of UBINIG (Policy Research for Development Alternative) a policy research and advocacy group in Bangladesh working as an integral part of the community with the grassroots people to strengthen common resistance against the dominant processes of globalisation as well as creating space for strategic negotiations whenever possible.

Since the early days of his intellectual career, Farhad Mazhar has always been committed to Karl Marx, particularly because of his analysis of capital and the formation of revolutionary subjects. His recent intellectual contribution is more concerned with the critical understanding of religion, spirituality and the question of class narratives in a post-colonial society. He is virulently critical of the vulgar materialist reduction of Marx's contribution as well as the teachings of his revolutionary followers by the conventional Left in Bangladeshi Mazhar argues for a new politics which is more informed by the experience of the failure of previous socialist projects and the recent developments in philosophy and politics. Beside being an accomplished poet, he is considered as the major radical thinker in Bangladesh.

After Mazhar had been arrested in 1995, Nadine Gordimer, Jacques Derrida and Mahasweta Devi wrote a letter in New York Times saying, "We join our voices to theirs in demanding the immediate release of Farhad Mazhar and restoration of full citizen's rights, including due process."

Following the 2013 Motijheel Shootings, Mazhar was one of the few Bangladeshi public intellectuals within Bangladesh to challenge the government's disinformation campaign and the liberal logic of massacre. William Gomes has recently compared Farhad Mazhar with Abdul Hamid Khan Bhashani and said "Farhad Mazhar, who has continuously battled against the current fascistic regime with tolerates no dissent and demands absolute loyalty from the local press corps. He very recently stand alone against the covered-up massacre in Dhaka, where unarmed protesters were allegedly extrajudicially killed by the law enforcement agencies as they meditated and slept in the early hours on May 6th under cover of darkness."

Prose

Poetry