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TO THE EDITOR
A mayhem
The whole nation is dumbfounded at the assassination attempt on Sheikh Hasina, the president of the AL and Opposition Leader in the House. The gory sight of ripped corpses and that of blood-soaked leaders as carried on the front pages of Dhaka dailies (August 22) including the DS saddened us greatly and our words failed to condemn the heinous acts of mayhem. Our deep sorrow and prayer go with the members of the bereaved families.
As the reports unveil, a second attempt was also made to kill Sk. Hasina when she hurried into her bullet-proof sports vehicle which was shot at seven times. How come grenades were hurled from the roof-tops, but that all escaped the notice of hundreds of police and intelligence
men present there! And the perpetrators manage to move away. Then what they (police) were there for? To let such a gruesome incident take place? The government, and for that matter its law enforcers, cannot evade the responsibility of loss of so many lives. Sk Hasina, while in Istanbul, received death threat over telephone, and she let the government know of that so that proper security was commissioned for her. But that was not seriously heeded and she was targeted in full force. Since the BNP led alliance took over, the police have been on the run after the AL to foil its meetings, processions. The AL central office remains hemmed by large contingents of police forces, always ready to foil any attempt by Awami League adherents to gather and speak about the omissions and
commissions of the alliance government. This is Bangladesh style of democracy under the alliance government, where the main opposition AL's right to gather, demonstrate and criticise the government either in the streets or in the House is muzzled by brute force and brute majority.
We must get out of this cycle of absolute domination by the majority. AH Dewan
South Kafrul, Dhaka Cantt.
Dhaka
Psychological crisis
Mahfuzul Haque wrote on an interesting subject which was headlined "Cultural dilemma." He questioned the need for celebrating the occasions like Valentine's Day and all such days. I think we don't celebrate these days in
the real sense. What works in our mentality is imitating the West. The West gives the theme and the East follows it that is the truth.
We adopt their ideas. This kind of adoption and copying is the sign of a psychological crisis. We are not confident about our culture.
Sifatuddin
Dept. of International Relations University of Dhaka.
AL and BNP: Two sides of the same coin
The article under the above caption, published in the DS on July 28, was most appropriate and very timely. The writer has vividly described the current situation of our politics and I think he has nicely echoed the feelings of many of your readers. We are really
very helplessly watching the ignominious display of party politics by the two major players. They care little about the people or the country. They do not see anything beyond their party interest. Once in power, they want to perpetuate it and when in opposition they try to regain it by any means, even at the cost of national interest. But how long should we so helplessly watch such irresponsible behaviour of successive governments?
In fact, we really enjoy the benefit of a neutral administration during the three months of caretaker government. Terrorists disappear, a quiet political atmosphere prevails and people live in peace and tranquility. The basic reason for such peaceful atmosphere can undoubtedly be attributed to the selection of neutral,
highly educated and eminent personalities in different professions to run the caretaker administration. Where do these people come from? They are very much with us but not in the political arena. So if we could elect people like them to run the country , then possibly we could attain real progress and prosperity in a reasonable time frame. But in the present context it will be a daydream to expect that these people could be elected to the parliament, because it needs huge money and muscle to successfully contest an election and these gentlemen are nowhere near it. Besides, these people are not grouped in a political platform from where any nation-wide campaigning can be conducted. There are many other problems which may stand on the way
of bringing them to contest the national election. Taking all these negative aspects into account, it is pretty difficult to expect any change in the existing system. The crucial question is now how to bring about a change? Well, there may not be any easy way to achieve it but then I would like to believe that the civil society can come up to help the nation recover from the present crisis.
In my humble opinion a campaign should be started right now to organise the civil society to select some 300 people from every nook and cranny of the country for the equal number of parliamentary seats. They should be absolutely honest, educated, strictly committed to the welfare of the nation and its people, permanent inhabitants of the respective constituencies and
should not be loan defaulters to any major political party. The procedure for selection of such personalities may be worked out by elucidating public opinion.
The campaign for the people so selected may be carried forward by the newspapers, members of the civil society, non-partisan student bodies, professionals of various disciplines, teachers, writers, artists and a cross section of people. What is actually needed is a sincere and unbiased call from the respected people.
I would request the readers to express their opinions on the issue.
A. Sahir
Mirpur, Dhaka