Berkley Center

Background: The context for this discussion is preparation for a consultation on faith and development in South and Central Asia, held in Dhaka, Bangladesh January 10-11, 2011. The consultation is an endeavor of the World Faiths Development Dialogue (WFDD), the Berkley Center for Religion, Peace, and World Affairs at Georgetown University, with support from the Henry R. Luce Foundation. Its aim is to take stock of the wide range of ongoing work by different organizations that are, in varying ways, inspired by religious faith, but more important, to explore the policy implications that emerge from their interactions with development organizations. The interview was conducted by telephone between Michael Bodakowski and Fadlullah Wilmot. Mr. Wilmot is currently Director of Islamic Relief in Pakistan. An earlier interview with Mr. Wilmot focused on Southeast Asia. In this interview, Mr. Wilmot discusses his work with Muslim NGOs in Indonesia, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, and Pakistan. He focuses on country specific intervention and challenges, as well as region wide lessons and experiences, with attention to the strengths, weaknesses, and challenges of faith-inspired organizations working on development. He stresses how far the country context, including among Muslim majority countries, has a strong influence on the interaction between communities, faith understanding, and development; he brings highlights the various gender challenges in this context.

You have worked in many world regions in different capacities on the intersection of faith and development. How has your personal journey brought you to work in South Asia, and to your present position in Pakistan?

I was born in England, but I migrated with my parents as a kid, so all of my education has been in Australia. After graduating from the University of Tasmania and teaching for a few years, I joined Australia Volunteers Abroad (AVA). While I was at university I had become a Muslim through my friendship with students from Asia. I first visited Indonesia in 1967. AVA sent me to Aceh in Indonesia, where I taught at the University of Syiah Kuala. Then I met my wife and we got married in 1972.

I was interested in Aceh and its history and formed a friendship with the leader of the independence struggle there, who was also an Ulama Teunku, Muhammad Dawud Beureuh. While in Acheh I learned Indonesian and Acehnese. I moved back to Australia after completing my contract with AVA. My wife wanted to stay in Aceh, close to her family, but because of the conflict there, we settled down in Malaysia where we lived for many years. Since Indonesia’s independence, Aceh had been in a continuous state of conflict with the central government due to the unfair exploitation of its natural resources and a sort of cultural and political imperialism by the central government. Living and working in Asia made me aware of how much poverty affects people and the quality of their lives.

In Malaysia, I worked with several different institutions. One of the most interesting and challenging was my stint at the International Islamic University which was founded in 1985 as an attempt to equip students with the best of both Islamic and modern knowledge. As head of the Rector’s office I worked with the Rector and academic staff to revamp the system from a British-based term system to one using credit hours and semesters with double majors. We also built two new campuses. We provided scholarships for poor students from all over the Muslim world.

Then I retired from the University and went into business for a while with some friends. The business involved Indonesia and Aceh, so I was able to maintain my contacts there. Then I was asked if I could teach about management; it seemed that I had become proficient in management issues and after a while I began teaching management to executives as a qualified trainer from the British Institute of Leadership and Management.

Then on Boxing Day 2004 a destructive tsunami hit Aceh; I was sort of semi-retired at that time but I knew the then CEO of Muslim Aid, who asked me to go there on a volunteer basis to help alleviate the suffering of the people of Aceh, because it was an enormous disaster which had destroyed much infrastructure and resulted in the deaths of around 250,000 people. These included about 200 relatives of my wife, among them two nephews. I went to Aceh with Muslim Aid to assist in the relief and rehabilitation work. Due to the enormity of the disaster the work become more and more demanding and finally, as a 24/7 occupation, I had to take it up full time.

Muslim Aid established an office in Aceh, originally with me and a driver but later it expanded and we were able to contribute to providing housing for the victims of the tsunami. We then became involved in disaster risk reduction, and capacity building for local NGOs, microcredit activities, as well as a flood mitigation project for the Central Business District of the capital of the province, Banda Aceh.

While I was working on the relief effort in Aceh, a disastrous earthquake hit Yogyakarta in Java which, although it did not take as many lives, caused far more people to become homeless. Muslim Aid provided immediate emergency relief and later got involved in rehabilitation work in helping communities and in particular vulnerable and marginalized people to rebuild their homes and restore livelihoods. Later we started working with the ultra poor and orphans in Yogyakarta as well as community based disaster risk reduction.

We then got involved in Jakarta, helping the victims of the worst floods for many years. In 2007, in March and September after two earthquakes in west Sumatra we provided emergency relief and rehabilitation. Basically the office in Indonesia expanded from two staff with a rented vehicle to an organization of 100 staff with 10 offices, all over the country. I also set up a Muslim Aid office in Cambodia and arranged for our staff from Indonesia to help the victims of a cyclone in the Philippines and Vietnam as well as the tsunami in the Solomon Islands.

I was also involved in a program with our Sri Lanka Office, whose objective was to share the lessons from the Aceh peace process with the different religious communities in Sri Lanka, together with the United Methodist Committee on Relief.

After almost three years in Aceh I was transferred to Bangladesh by Muslim Aid after Cyclone Sidr in November 2007. It seems that I end up wherever there has been a big disaster.

In November 2010 I arrived in Pakistan to take charge of the Islamic Relief office there which is involved in the emergency relief and the rehabilitation work for victims of the floods that began in July 2010. Islamic Relief is also involved in economic empowerment and peace building.

With such a varied career, how would you describe the main challenges you have faced?

My It has indeed been a challenge to work in these very different world regions; working in Indonesia was different from working in Bangladesh, which is very different from working in Pakistan. I have thus worked with two British Muslim faith-based organizations in very different environments. It has always been important to empower local people and listen to local wisdom and bear in mind the reservations many colleagues in the humanitarian community have about faith-based organizations. The relationship between faith and development and relief is not an easy one, and I have found a lot of suspicion, mistrust and blatant undermining of our work. It has been difficult to understand why Muslim FBOs are singled out for criticism while a few western faith based organizations which have openly used their aid as a means of proselytization are less targeted.

It is even more galling to face this sort of attitude where the organizations for which I have worked have emphasized that the teachings of Islam prescribe that all needy persons, Muslim or non-Muslim, have the right to our help without discrimination. We are using a rights-based approach for humanity as a whole. Perhaps some secular humanitarian agencies as well as some western FBOs have not yet been willing to accept Muslim FBOs as equal partners; the tendency has been exacerbated by the terrorist attacks on the USA and the UK. In spite of this, Muslim Aid has worked with UMCOR (a Christian agency), Oxfam (a secular agency), and various UN agencies. Islamic Relief has worked with CAFOD (a Catholic agency) as well as various UN agencies.

The work of some western agencies has sometimes been insensitive to Muslim concerns and there was a need to address allegations of attempts at proselytizing in Aceh by some organizations which raised suspicion about other western FBOs which were sincerely working without any ulterior motives.

Can you speak about your work in Bangladesh with Muslim Aid? What are the most pressing development challenges facing Bangladesh today, and what are the faith dimensions?

Although Bangladesh is on track to achieve a number of the MDGs, and the Prime Minister recently received an award from the UN, the poorest 20 percent of the population get only five percent of the nation's income, while the richest 20 percent get more than half. Gender inequality and other types of exclusion limit access to jobs, assets, political influence, justice, nutrition and services for many women. It could be said that the most pressing development challenges facing Bangladesh are poverty, climate change, natural disasters, bureaucracy, corruption and a dysfunctional politics centered on the urban-based elite in Dhaka. These elites, whether secular or Islamic, fail to incorporate the real life concerns and attitudes of the rural and urban poor (especially the ultra-poor) into their plans for the future, in spite of the lofty vision of the revised National Strategy for Accelerated Poverty Reduction (NSAPR). In my experience Bangladesh has been the most difficult location to work in and, although in my interactions with politicians, bureaucrats and local NGOs I received full cooperation, it might seem strange that I encountered the challenges I did in a Muslim-majority country. I did not face similar problems in Indonesia or even in Cambodia, Sri Lanka, or Pakistan.

I think the problem in Bangladesh lies in the relationship between religion as the basis of the foundation of Pakistan (East Bengal was then a part), and the effort to maintain the integrity of Pakistan based on religion, led by certain Islamic groups. For the freedom fighters of Bangladesh, any attempt to raise questions about the liberation struggle was and still is regarded as a betrayal, so there are still some very strong feelings among those who see themselves as the vanguard for the liberation of Bangladesh and groups which are seen as not have fully supported the struggle. This spills over into the issue of war crimes committed during the independence struggle. Some religious groups were seen not to be fully supporting the separation of Bangladesh from Pakistan (they had their own logic) and the impact of this legacy has meant that some elements in the community harbor a deep suspicion of all organizations with an Islamic label; they are seen as not wanting Bangladesh to be an independent country.

Generally, in Bangladesh people are religious in orientation, whether Hindu, Muslim, or Christian. They have a love of religion. Gallup and Pew polls and studies of Muslim attitudes have found that 99 percent of the people in Bangladesh believe that religion has an important role in their daily lives; this reality has an impact how we do our work in the country. However, there are different narratives about the role of religion, for example, the secular-nationalist and the Islamic fundamentalist; but these are both elite constructs where elites tend to look down on the rural poor. Women are subject to violence and marginalization.

In our work, I found that people would look closely at our sincerity and how we are behaving with them; everyone is receptive to people that are religious. Muslims and non-Muslims are receptive to things done for them by Muslims and others (in Bangladesh 86 percent are Muslim, and 14 percent are non-Muslim). I have not seen conflict in the country between religious groups. I found Bangladesh to be a very peaceful country in the context of relations of people with faith.

I was in a village that was 70 percent Hindu, about a year ago. Muslims like to say a religious prayer as they start the construction of a house, so we called the village Hindu priest to say a prayer at the front pillar of a home we had constructed for the community. A very old Hindu woman came to me and said, “You are a very good man.” The village was very receptive and appreciative that a Muslim organization offered a Hindi prayer and had Hindus building their house.

With 900 staff in 75 offices around the country, Muslim Aid in Bangladesh is involved in interest free microcredit, small and medium enterprise (SME) development, livelihood recovery from disasters, economic empowerment of both rural and urban women, as well as unemployed poor youth who receive training at Muslim Aid’s five vocational training institutes providing skills such as driving, computer skills, tailoring, electrical wiring, engine repair, air conditioner and refrigerator repair, mobile phone repair and other marketable skills, so a former rickshaw driver can become a chauffeur.

There are also about 100 small schools for kids that drop out of school. Presently about 50 percent of kids drop out of school in Bangladesh, mainly due to poverty. These kids get a chance to rejoin the formal education system and they are provided with something very important: self confidence. While I was with Muslim Aid, we also gave scholarships to orphans so they could complete their education and stipends for poor and disabled kids for university, college, or high school. There are four hospitals mainly providing health care for women and children and, as Bangladesh is very disaster-prone, there is a huge emergency and relief operation. Unfortunately, Bangladesh, one of the poorest countries in the world, is also the one most affected by climate change. Muslim Aid has been rebuilding houses, wells and latrines, as well as providing immediate medical and water supplies to people who have endured cyclones and floods, helping them to restore their livelihoods so that they can return to their normal lives.

We also had one microfinance program, based on Islamic principles, to get people out of poverty through their own efforts. Over 60,000 families escaped poverty through this effort. Even though Dr. Yunus’ Grameen bank has been extremely successful, in order to make it sustainable, the interest rates must be lower. They are now about 30 percent, which some view as too high.

In Bangladesh, given the high respect for, and importance of religion in society, are their areas where you think faith-inspired actors bring particularly pertinent approaches, as opposed to secular organizations?

Secular organizations are also committed, and also sincere with the personal dimension they bring to their work, but I think faith-inspired organizations bring a higher level of commitment to the most marginalized members of society. As an Islamic organization, we want to help people that are the poorest and left out of mainstream development work. In Bangladesh, 20 percent of the people are what you would call ultra poor; they miss out of village level development and on government welfare and support. As a faith-based organization, our interest is to help these people, the most marginalized of a population. We bring a very strong faith commitment to our work.

My new organization, Islamic Relief, has been active in trying to get institutional donors like the UN and the EC to understand the positive role of faith based organizations in relief and development work. Islamic Relief is working on revising its values and therefore its mission and vision in line with Islamic values and making it clear to all stakeholders how these values permeate its work, but in a manner that is inclusive and in line with its obligations under the different codes of conduct like the Red Cross, Humanitarian Accountability Partnership (HAP) and others. Muslim Aid is also trying to come to grips with these issues.

What has been the role of faith-inspired actors in disaster relief in Bangladesh?

Many faith-inspired organizations are involved in disaster relief and developmental programs in Bangladesh. They have provided essential services to the victims of natural disaster with efficiency and compassion. Some European FBOs were funded by ECHO, as was Islamic Relief and Muslim Aid. Muslim Aid received funds from UMCOR after the Sidr and Aila cyclones. Mosques, temples and religious schools were used to help the victims of disasters.

A number of religious organizations are active in the development field. An Asian Foundation survey found that more than 80 percent of people in Bangladesh believe that religious leaders of all faiths should have a role in national development, over 64 percent of ordinary citizens believe religious leaders have a major role to play in guiding community thought on social issues, and over 70 percent would request the involvement or opinion of a religious or community leader at a shalish, or local mediation forum. One comment cited in the report is that “their theories about change do not only concern outward, social but also inner and personal transformation”

What work did you do in Sri Lanka? What do you see as the role of faith as the country transitions from protracted conflict to peace?

There has now been a military solution, but a military solution cannot be sustained unless there is a political solution. Muslim Aid works with people of all religions—Hindu, Muslim, and Buddhist. People need to come to live and work together as a community. You have to be able to change peoples’ manner of thinking about the other. This is where faith, understanding of different faiths, and a basic understanding of compassion for another plays a very important role.

Muslim Aid and UMCOR worked to share with faith communities in Sri Lanka the experience from Aceh in building peace. Unless you can build confidence at the grass roots, sustainable development and peace building will not be achieved. Children are not born to hate each other. If you teach a child that he/she is a Hindu or he/she is a Buddhist and people of the other faith are our enemy, the cycle of mistrust between religions will continue. It has to start with personal relationships at a small level, to build relationships and understanding between communities. Our efforts focus on this .

I think some of the most important lessons to be learned are that in the final analysis there can be no military solution to a conflict such as Sri Lanka; that there has to be genuine compromise and willingness on all sides of the conflict to address differences. There is a need to be able to work through informal channels and not rely solely on the government bureaucracy with the fixed and often inflexible positions that normally constrain them. This is where community participation is key. One other important issue to be addressed (which has yet to be addressed in Sri Lanka) is how to assist the young people that were fighting; how do you bring them back into civil society? These young men and women grew up fighting, and have no skills and no education.

Faith actors have made contributions to these issues, but the contributions have been limited on a national level due to the political dimensions. At the grassroots level, however, their role has been extremely important. When you have people in different villages of different faiths trying to live together peacefully, local religious leaders have played a particularly important role.

However, during the conflict, religious actors played many different roles, including supporting the conflict. Sri Lankan society is still working to come to terms with this fact; it has left a legacy of bitterness, and of dehumanizing others. Faith actors need to work together and with others to overcome this legacy and build a future more based on the compassion found in all religious traditions.

Moving on to Pakistan, what do you see as your chief challenges looking forward?

Pakistan is an extremely complex environment. The big challenges are poverty, lack of education, and lack of opportunity (as is also the case for Bangladesh) but the conflict in Afghanistan which has spilled over to Pakistan is having a huge impact on society. There seems to be a huge misunderstanding about the role of force in dealing with issues, which is being used as an excuse for violence. There is an element within Pakistani society which feels that blowing up innocent people and indoctrinating young people to commit violence is acceptable. This is a really a poison in the body politic and in religious understanding.

The use of force and violence to send a message is something that faith actors need to fight in Pakistan, as religion is being used as a motivating force for violence.

What roles have faith-inspired actors and religious leaders played in recent disaster relief efforts in Pakistan, including the floods and internal displacement? What have been the successes and challenges?

I have only been here a very short time so I can’t give a detailed account, but I know there are many organizations that are here to help others because of their religious commitments. However, my colleagues have informed me that there have been incidents where Western organizations (faith and non-faith based organizations) have had some reservations about the involvement of Muslim NGOs, perhaps due to the difficult political situation in Pakistan. Quite a number of new Muslim organizations based in the West like Muslim Hands have been active, as have non-faith organizations and faith-based organizations from other religious traditions.

The response has been very disparate in a way; some people have been handing out tents to people where they are; some are taking a more holistic approach, helping people return to their land where their homes were destroyed and setting up tents there; while some are helping to re-establish water supplies so that they can re-establish their livelihoods where they were living, rather than in camps. Unfortunately, there have also been some faith-based organizations that have used this as an opportunity for proselytizing which has created a negative impression for all faith-based organizations linked to that particular religious tradition.

This is what happened in the early stages of Aceh as well. Many FBOs come purely for humanitarian purposes, without any ulterior motives. However, in the initial stages of the Aceh response, a few FBOs saw it as an opportunity for proselytization and conversation. This affected all other FBOs from the same religious tradition, coloring attitudes towards them and making it more difficult for them to operate. As a Muslim FBO we tried to clarify that all organizations were signatories to the Red Cross Code of Conduct to help mitigate the suspicion.

In Bangladesh a National Consultation was held on CSO’s developmental effectiveness in June this year. It was part of a global process initiated in 2008 in Accra and a total of 71 organizations participated. However FBOs were deliberately and specifically excluded, along with politically-lined organizations. It seems strange that Asia Pacific Research Network (APRN) which facilitated the meeting which claimed it would maintain the utmost transparency and participation, excluded some of the important actors in the relief and development field active in Bangladesh from such a discussion, but it does indicate some of the attitudes which are still prevalent.

Given your regional experience in South Asia, from a policy perspective, do you see any common implications of faith on development in South Asia as a whole? Are there universal characteristics that can be applied region-wide when engaging faith-inspired actors/forming development policy?

In my experience the Muslim FBOs that I have worked with or have contact with do have some differences from other FBOs, although there are similarities. I think that most FBOs provide services efficiently and at lower cost as well as in a manner that is respectful of their religious convictions. Those I have worked with regard their work as an act of worship and therefore more emphasis is placed on reaching the marginalized and poorest elements of society and there is more effort to involve them in the whole process of assessment, delivery, monitoring, and evaluation of the interventions.

Most FBOs have staff from other religious traditions but Muslim FBOs have a higher percentage of Muslims and few have senior positions held by persons of another faith. Islamic Relief seems to have more non-Muslim staff than other Muslim NGOs. The heterogeneity has advantages in communicating the value system of the organization. The situation of non-Muslim FBOs is rather a mixed bag as some have quite a number of staff from other faiths but others are more restrictive and others reserve senior positions for persons of that particular faith.

The religious values of Islam do affect the culture of the Muslim FBOs and the leadership style as well as policies and strategic planning. Most are sensitive to the danger of isolationism and exclusivism and emphasize that they are inclusive organizations and do not discriminate on the basis of religion.

I have not experienced any concerted effort of FBOs to work together vis à vis non FBOs, but the impact of different FBOs with different religious traditions working together and working for those of other faiths has an important impact in reducing tensions and suspicions between those of different faiths, and is also an educational experience for the staff of FBOs.

Muslim NGOs working with Muslim communities find it easier to link their relief and rehabilitation efforts and to engage the participation of the beneficiaries in the process, in part because of their religious values. For example, even in communities where women’s education is discouraged, tackling the issue of education for both men and women is easier for a Muslim organization. We found it easier to motivate communities based on our shared Islamic values and the very language and greetings that we used. In some cases, as a Muslim INGO it was easier to get access to women. However as in all religions there are conservative trends and attitudes, but the Muslim FBOs I have been working with and in contact with have been able to broaden the minds of some staff that approached Islam from a very narrow perspective.

I have found in my work with Islamic Relief and Muslim Aid, that respect for the religious values and practices of Muslim beneficiaries helps in the delivery of services and improves and smooths relationships because of our shared Muslim beliefs and practices; it increases the level of trust and our understanding of the religious needs of Muslim beneficiaries and respect for the practices of non-Muslims. I found that in many cases religious beliefs were less respected by secular INGOs and even by some FBOs. However where there are partnerships between FBOs of different religious traditions and FBOs and ‘secular’ INGOs, there is an added value of increased understanding and respect. In areas of conflict where there is a religious element, having FBOs working together can have a positive impact. The downside is that in some situations like in Bangladesh, Sudan, Russia and China, being identified as a Muslim FBO can result in negative repercussions.

What are the implications of conflict on development in South Asia, and what have you seen as the role of faith-inspired actors in peacebuilding? What initiatives have been successful?

Conflict (political, religious, ethnic, gender) is a destructive force that has stymied development in Pakistan and in Bangladesh, and has held back progress on many fronts. As so many people in this region are inspired, and find meaning from their religious faith, by appealing to faith beliefs—to the things that they hold the dearest in their lives, one can try to overcome these conflicts. Islamic Relief has been working in Kashmir and Baluchistan on conflict transformation and peace.

In Aceh and in Java in Indonesia specific efforts have been made to include conflict transformation and the peaceful resolutions in the curriculum of Islamic schools.

Have you seen or been involved with any specific examples of peacebuilding by faith actors that have been successful?

In Pakistan a religious scholar established a school to “de-program” Talibanized youth, teaching that Islam is a religion of peace. In Aceh a peace curriculum has been developed. Islamic Relief has been successful in Kashmir and Baluchistan in dealing with conflict situations. Its work has been appreciated by donors and the government. It requires a long-term effort and lot of hard work to establish trust.

Islamic Relief held a series of workshops in Yemen attended by representatives from tribal leaders, imams, teachers, local NGOs, refugees, army and police officers, government officials, members of local courts and judges to discuss the causes and effects of conflicts, and explore methods to mitigate the effects of this on individuals, families and communities.

What are the gender challenges you have encountered? What are the faith dimensions, and are faith-inspired actors successfully working towards gender equality in development?

I think this is one of the unfinished agendas in South Asia. Although legally women have equal rights under the law and there are or have been female prime ministers in both Pakistan and Bangladesh, still if you look at the role of women and the level of women education and the mistreatment of women under the dowry system in Bangladesh, there is still a huge amount of work to be done before we attain gender quality.

Islamic Relief and Muslim Aid have both tried to ensure that women are consulted and represented in all of its programs, including disaster risk reduction programs, emergency relief programs, and housing programs and in all stages of its programs—from the initial stage to the monitoring stage, to the implementation stage, and to the evaluation stage.

Given traditional gender roles in society, are there challenges in ensuring equal participation?

Yes, it is not always easy to get women to participate. It was easier to do in Indonesia, with some effort doable in Bangladesh, but in Pakistan the only way we have been able to work with women is with women working with women. The effort is there, but I think also that we need to be accommodating to different cultural traditions; there is not only one way to get women involved in the development process and to get their opinions.

Islamic Relief formed women committees to provide input into its relief and rehabilitation activities in Pakistan even where the male members of the community did not encourage women’s participation.

In the three country contexts you discussed, what specific factors make it easier or harder to work with women?

In the Islamic religious tradition, there are still some very conservative understandings of the role of women in society. It is less so in Indonesia, more pronounced in Bangladesh (though there is a rising conservative force in the country), and quite conservative and restrictive in Pakistan, making it difficult to work with women.

In Indonesia women can easily participate in joint meetings with men, in Bangladesh it is possible in some contexts, but not always, and in Pakistan in some areas it is almost impossible to get village women to participate in the same meetings as men. Therefore, you have to design your programs in a way to accommodate these different cultural sensitivities, keeping in mind that you need to make sure that women are engaged and involved, and make decisions.

In Pakistan I am working for Islamic Relief, a Muslim faith-based organization, and there are a limited number of women in senior management positions but there is a continuous effort to include more women in the organization. At HQ level in the UK women in management positions are well-represented. In Bangladesh it was not easy to recruit women to senior management positions and some professional women felt uneasy in working with a Muslim organization.

What is the role of faith in education, both country-specific and regionally? How should development policy makers and governments view faith-inspired educational institutions as a part of the overall education landscape? What roles do, and should they play?

I think governments should welcome the role of FBOs in developing people with character. What I have seen happening in Muslim Aid’s vocational training centers in Dhaka, Chittagong, Rangpur, Jessore and Teknaf is that they are producing people of good character and that are useful to society; people whose motivation comes from their religious faith. I do not think governments should fear faith-inspired educational institutions which are helping to raise children to become useful, productive members of society.

In countries where the government educations system is often ineffective and does not reach 50 percent of the population, the religious Islamic schools which provide free education, food, books and clothing to students are providing a very useful service.

Can you expand on interfaith initiatives you have been involved in? What roles do, or should interfaith initiatives have in development in South Asia?

What I have seen in some contexts is that there still is some suspicion of FBOs, especially Muslim organizations, among secular organizations. There is hesitancy within non faith-based organizations to work with faith-based organizations, especially Muslim organizations.

Concerning work between and among faiths—in Bangladesh, we were forming an International NGO forum, and I sent an email to the FBOs in Bangladesh to see if they thought if it would be a good idea to form a forum of faith-based organizations, to work together and exchanges ideas. I only got one response back out of ten emails sent; they were not eager to coordinate.

I am not sure why this is so. The organizations were willing to cooperate in a general forum, but not in a faith-based specific forum. Perhaps they did not want to feel different than other development organizations, or perhaps they did not feel the need to cooperate with organizations of other faiths.

In Pakistan there is an effort to get Muslim INGOs to work together under the aegis of the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC).

Much research has been done on the intersection of faith and development in South Asia. In your view, are there specific areas that deserve greater understanding and attention?

There may be some scholars working on the intersection of faith and development in South Asia, but there is no widespread knowledge or understanding within the general public or even FBOs. I have never seen anything of quality written in the major local (national) newspapers, either in local languages, or in English about faith and development. There is very little understanding among government officials as well. To bridge this gap, I think that scholars need to sit down with both faith-based organizations and opinion and political leaders to show the impact of the work of faith-based organizations on development. I do not think there has been a forum between scholars and faith-based organizations in their countries.

I think there needs to be a renewed and wider understanding of the contribution of actors inspired by their faith to the development process in South Asia. Religious leaders and organizations have an in-depth understanding of the needs and interests of local communities. They can better communicate local priorities to those involved in the development process and also give more accurate and first-hand feedback on whether the goals of poverty reduction, women’s empowerment, and other development initiatives are being met at the local level.