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To The Editor
Sunnydale on a rainy day
I appreciate Asmat Ara Rahim's letter "Attention: Sunnydale School" (printed in the DS on September 16) and her concerns about our country's natural calamities. However, I beg to differ with her on keeping the school closed citing this reason. I, on the other hand, thank the management of Sunnydale School for functioning normally even after experiencing a natural calamity. If majority of the students could come to the school premises even after braving the deluge, why wouldn't the school authorities keep it open? Another good reason to keep the school functioning is that almost all the schools extended their summer holidays due to the grenade attack on the Awami League rally on August 21. Schools in Dhaka city have been kept closed on slightest pretext. I am also a parent of two school-going children. They go to Banani's Playpen school. Over the last week, every morning, except a day or two, my kids went to school only to see that there would be no school. I watched them returning home with gloomy faces.
I can understand Asmat Ara Rahim's point that we should not ignore calamities, but there's another calamity about to happen in our children's lives. They are have become frustrated because they think they are missing out and their teachers won't be able to complete their syllabus. At the same time, they are turning out to be 'day-long television watchers'
Ekram Kabir
Gulshan, Dhaka
***
It gives us immense pleasure that Sunnydale authorities have taken timely and prompt initiative for holding off all classes owing to these rainy days. They have also taken the steps for holding the make up tests later.
I appreciate the measures adopted by the school.
Asmat Ara Rahim
Indira Road
JS incident and the commentary
This refers to your commentary "Honourable Speaker, you could have taken the Jatiya Sangsad to a greater height" published in your Daily of 18 September.
As you already know I have been an admirer of your thoughtful writings for quite sometime now. This commentary too is no exception. What happened the other day at the Jatiya Sangsad was far from desirable. However, your contention that the Hon. Speaker could have taken the Jatiya Sangsad to greater heights to my mind reflects only half the truth. One of the first statements right after the 8/21 incident was made by both the Leader of the Opposition and its Secretary General something to the effect that the ruling party was the one responsible for the bombings. As you have rightly observed, much bitterness and hatred exist between the two parties. I am afraid the opposition is also no less guilty for this. Admittedly, the ruling party is guilty of innumerable failures, yet the fact remains that the opposition too has failed to display any real wisdom and maturity in dealing with emerging issues.
My first and foremost concern of the day was the storming by the opposition lawmakers of the Speaker's podium. I do not remember the year but there was an incident that took place on the floor of the then East Pakistan National Assembly where a chair was thrown at the then Deputy Speaker, Mr. Shahed Ali, as a result of which he subsequently succumbed to his injuries.
In the final analysis, both the parties, the ruling and the opposition, have miserably failed us. The majority of the peace loving people of the country are not interested in " the game of politics" which today resembles the oldest profession in the world.
Shamsher Chowdhury
Dhaka
India above criticism?
The readers and the columnists of The Daily Star are far more critical of the policies of the United States than any other nation. Yet, I have noticed that whenever India is criticised even mildly in your paper, Indians and even some Bangladeshis jump to India's defence! Could it be that the US democracy is strong and it can withstand criticism, and India's democracy is weak, so it cannot? Or is it that India never makes mistakes, therefore, cannot be criticised at all?
For example, I was intrigued by Shejuti Khan's (Letter to The Editor,
September 15), a response to Dr. Fakhruddin Ahmed's column "For friendship Bangladesh should look East" (The Daily Star, September 12). Khan compares Dr. Ahmed's suggestion that Bangladesh should look East for trade with Canada looking to Greenland for trade. How one can compare Bangladesh looking for trade with the densely-populated, rising industrial powers such as China, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia, with Canada looking for trade with a chunk of ice, Greenland, is perhaps only understood by Khan. Khan also says America's neighbours are unhappy with it. I am not aware of any outstanding territorial and water-sharing disputes between the US and Canada or Mexico, as exists between India and Bangladesh. On the contrary, there is free trade between the three nations; trucks loaded with Canadian and Mexican goods have free entry into the US. India, on the other hand, severely restricts entry of Bangladeshi goods into its territory.
It is understandable for Indians to promote the interest of their country, but why should Bangladeshis also start promoting the interest of India? Kabir Mia New York
DU scene
As a student of DU, I am really frustrated about my future. Whenever something goes wrong, why should we be the only sufferers!
We, the general students , have nothing to do with politics but our academic life is completely halted by it. So for the welfare of the future generation, the university should be opened immediately!
Nusrat
Dpt of Information science, DU
A migrant speaks
I refer to the letter 'Why I am not a migrant' from Dr. OM Ohidul Alam (DS 06/09/04).
According to Dr. Alam, educated Bangladeshi migrants are opportunists, escapists, selfish and bla bla bla. They feel safe and happy within their families in a nice house with a green backyard and a posh car at the portico. He is also critical of his migrant friends' happy-go-lucky attitude that almost leads to heaven! Different people have different observational attitude towards life, country and imaginable surroundings. However, many abstract feelings are obviously circumstantial, but love remains the same for motherland. Rather it goes up in many instances. Perhaps Dr. Alam failed to look at the inner sight of his friends to some extent if not totally. I think this parochial approach led him to paint migrants in a single brush, of course very ruthlessly. There are many dedicated migrants helping the people living in the barren edge of the society. Those migrants do not expect any recognition or publicity or do not cherish to contest any election to grab more wealth. We salute them. We also salute those honest contributors living inside the country but love to remain out of zoom. We appreciate his strong social commitment and deliveries other than his medical profession. But I failed to understand why he opted to measure his materialistic achievement, social deliveries and personal mind-set against his wealthy but 'escapist' friends.
Tarik Zaman
School of Land, Water and Crop Sciences
The University of Sydney, Australia
Inhuman treatment
The news of a crime committed by a madrasah teacher in a remote village of Bogra, once again manifested the ill of unplanned, uncontrolled religious education system in our country. The ears of 17 minors were cut/mutilated by a teacher enraged because the students were not reciting their studies loudly enough. People gave the teacher a good beating but did not care to lodge a case against the offender. However, local police started a suo moto case and arrested the offending teacher. Allegation of torture and other abuses are common with many such institutions. But only the sensational ones are published in newspapers, and perhaps only then some actions are taken.
Of late, private madrasahs have had a mushroom growth. It appears there is none to control or to determine the curriculum. I have gone through some ads claiming 'English medium cadet madrasah' and so on. No one knows what they teach there.
In Uttara residential area dozens of such dubious madrasahs have cropped up in the last few years. Some female madrasahs are here in a single building, inmates of which are not allowed even to go to the roof of the building.
The private madrasah owners claim that they do not follow government rules because they do not take any money from the public exchequer. The government may have the same thinking. But none should forget that the students are future citizens. So all such educational institutions should be brought under public scrutiny. We don't want to hear any more torture story from any educational institutions.
M Sanaul Huq
Uttara, Dhaka
On Towfique
Hassan's letter
I fully sympathise with Mr. Towfique Hassan (September 16, 2004 ) and for his son. I wish any of us had any answer or remedy for their plight. The only reason these so called developed countries harass us is that they can. I live in the US and I am in touch with many Indian and Pakistani students here. Frankly speaking, Indians never have this kind of problem. Same for Pakistan, to a lesser extent. Before September 11, 2001 Indian students sometimes were given US visa on mail. They never even had to show up at
the embassy. I never heard an Indian and Pakistani saying that their wife might not get a visa. Bangladesh is probably the only country in the world where the wives of students have difficulty getting a US spouse visa. I personally know several Bangladeshis whose wife never got US visa and they had to leave the US.
The fact is that we are one of the poorest countries in the world and the image, let's not even talk about it. Given the type of utter corrupt politicians, devoid of any trace of human virtues, no wonder Bangladesh is destined to remain one of the poorest for a long, long time. So, the developed countries look at us as a bunch of poor hungry.
Nayeem Mano
US
Tragic indeed!
Today (17.09.04), I read a news in The Daily Star that one madrasah teacher, named Abdul Majid, cut the earlobes of twelve students who did not read the Holy Qu'ran loudly. What a tragedy! I have no words to condemn it and I am afraid of thinking that there may be many so called moulanas in our society who do not have any respect for human rights. They are not serving Islam.
We should take this issue seriously and be aware of the so called Islamists.
Kazi Firoz
Kosice, Slovakia
A misunderstood religion
What has happened in Beslan is a manifestation of the desperate acts of some desperate people -- a people who have lost more than the number of victims in the Beslan tragedy in their struggle for independence. It has nothing to do with Islam or religious fanaticism .
The West does not understand Islam. On the contrary, it is awed by the power of it. That is why they have fought it in the crusades and are now trying to fight it using their media and their armies. Let us not be swayed by the western interpretation of events.
Shomit Chowdhury
On e-mail
How long should we wait ?
After the fall of dictatorship in Bangladesh, a lot of us thought that "Okay, here comes prosperity". Oh boy was I wrong! Some politicians started to take advantage of this new found freedom and turned "our freedom" into chaos. I am not writing to blame the opposition or the government. We have already seen that before. I don't want to hear from Hasina that the government is doing everything wrong and so we have the chaos; nor do I want to hear Khaleda blaming Hasina for everything. It is time to look beyond the same old issues. Now, you will probably laugh at my writing and say what is new about that. A lot of people have already expressed similar feelings like mine and nothing happened. But then should I just keep my mouth shut and see my country go downhill (it is already down there according to the rest of the world).
The main reason I am writing this letter is to express my frustration. I
am a software engineer in the US. I am seeing all the IT jobs going away to India but nowhere in Bangladesh. Why? Do we not have engineers in Bangladesh? Let me reassure that I know that some Bangladeshis have more talent than a lot of the Indians. Then why are we not getting a piece of the outsourcing pie? Because of my experience, I myself am willing to invest in Bangladesh and start an outsourcing business with our boys and girls - but at what risk?
If I go to Hasina and ask her to stop all the hartals and chaos she will just go on complaining about the government. How do I explain to her
that the government is not calling the hartal. Now, please do not think I am a BNP fan. I do not care much about that party. I want to see peace and that is all! However, because BNP is in power, we need to work with them to get our security. Russel Siddique
On e-mail
Gas export
A local TV channel showed the interview of Mr. Peterson, the US deputy Foreign Secretary. In that interview he strongly criticised Bangladesh for not exporting gas to India. We strongly protest this kind of criticism. How can he be so sure about what our people want? Why did not they criticise India for not
giving us water? We would highly appreciate if they do not interfere so much in our internal affairs. Our people will decide when and to whom we will sell or not sell our gas.
And TV channels should take constructive and inspirational interviews, not frustrating and insulting interviews, which can irritate us.
Nazrul Islam Rizvi
Nurjahan Road, Muhammadpur, Dhaka
Good neighbourliness
Dr. Fakhruddin Ahmed's article "For
friendship Bangladesh should look East" published in The Daily Star on 12 September is amateurish writing. Bangladesh Foreign Minister Mr. M. Morshed Khan's outburst on India needs much more critical analysis than Dr. Fakhruddin's sentimentalist views. Your Editorial "The foreign minister's fury" on 10 September is balanced.
Let us face the truth. India can sustain, absorb some few billion dollar loss, but Bangladesh can't. India has a wide range of subjects to help, like education, health, infrastructure, information technology etc. But Bangladesh has only limited scope.
MK Barua
New Delhi
Should we look East?
When I read Dr. Fakhruddin Ahmed's hard-hitting, yet correct article, "For friendship Bangladesh should look East" (September 12), I knew right away that the apologists for India in Bangladesh would jump all over him. Shejuti Khan (Letter, DS, September 15) is the first one. It don't want to defend Dr. Ahmed, because I don't think he needs my defending. I know the fact is that Dr. Ahmed's heart is in the right place; he is a fierce advocate of Bangladesh, and a defender of the rights of Bangladesh. I wish I could say the
same about his detractors, such as Ms. Khan. Instead of blasting Dr. Ahmed for his defence of Bangladesh, Ms. Khan should educate herself by reading Mr. Abdur Razzak's article, "Bangladesh in a section of Indian press" (DS, September 15) on the horrible things her favourite Indians are saying about Bangladesh!
Unable to refute Dr. Ahmed's message, Ms. Khan attacks the messenger personally. Ms. Khan very cleverly does not address a single genuine grievance Bangladesh nurses against India, namely; India restricts entry of Bangladeshi goods into India; India does not really "share" water with Bangladesh, Bangladesh receives too little water during winter and too much water during the rainy season aggravating Bangladesh's annual flooding; even after 30 years India is yet to cede to Bangladesh equivalent land in exchange for Bangladeshi enclaves Dahagram and Angarpota which Sheikh Mujib had handed over to in India in 1975; India openly favours one of the two major political parties in Bangladesh, which Bangladeshis considers interference in its internal affairs; India continues to accuse Bangladesh of harbouring non-existent terrorist camps while refusing to dismantle known anti-Bangladesh terrorist camps that do exist in India. Instead, Ms. Khan ridicules Dr. Ahmed for raising minor, incon-
sequential and peripheral issues such as Bangladesh's thus far
unsuccessful desire to join ASEAN
and India's repression of the people of the Seven Sisters of the NorthEast as depicted in the Indian movie, “Dil Se."
Starting with her dislike of the current and previous governments of Bangladesh, in her very long letter Ms. Khan does not say a single positive thing about Bangladesh!
Rashed Firoz
New York