BNP is planning to embark on mass contacts with 400 public meetings and rallies slated across the 300 parliamentary constituencies of the country in February and March. Evidently, the whole exercise seems designed to mobilise public support for the party keeping in view the national elections which are round the corner. The focus is on mass rallies and processions, with an eschewal of the hartal option, prompted by the felt need to cultivate public support rather than alienation at a time when the general election is only some months away.

As we welcome this election-centric thinking within the BNP leadership, manifest in an inverse proportion to the decline of agitational politics, we urge them to do the next thing that logically follows from such a change of emphasis. As the bed-rock of electoral politics which it is otherwise poised to launch through a series of meet-the-people initiatives, BNP must now put an end to its parliamentary boycott and assume the full responsibility of an opposition party in the House of the People. It is never too late for a good move. Yes, we can see that only six months are left to the life of the seventh parliament, and at best there can be two more sessions of the Jatiya Sangsad before the nation went to the polls. So what?

Our one-liner counsel to BNP leader Begum Zia would be : "It is precisely because the parliament's tenure is running out that you must see it fit to walk back to the JS all at once." It would be too skin-deep and blinkered a judgement on the BNP's part to be feeding on a diet of masticated politics, even now. Let's catalogue the benefits which the BNP appears certain to derive from resuming its abandoned parliamentary role. Aside from obviating the embarrassing charade of signing the attendance register just before the expiry of the 90-day absence period to retain parliamentary membership or circumventing the contingency of submitting resignation en masse, the BNP stands to benefit substantially from taking to parliamentary politics even at this stage.

If the BNP as a major political force in the country went back to parliament it would bring a dramatic change in politics, a paradigm shift to it in terms of perspective, quality and direction. Begum Zia will signal the restoration of her own faith in the parliamentary system thereby enhancing the people's faith in it with a resonating effect.

If she can utilise the remaining two-and-a-half or two sessions of parliament to air her grievances through to the people BNP will be moving that much closer to its constituents. The opposition will get much wider media access while the electronic coverage of parliamentary proceedings will be politically educative for the people at a most propitious pre-election time. The budget session of parliament would present a fabulous opportunity for the opposition to draw popular attention to their platform. The MPs from BNP who have been reduced to the position of any other party member will regain their sense of purpose. Besides, the dire need to change the electoral laws makes BNP's attendance in the parliament all the more imperative.

In all, it is with the image of a vibrant parliament erasing all the stains of the past that all the political parties will go to the polls in a state of high public approbation which will be a big stimulus to the process of free and fair elections.