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TO THE EDITOR
A disease of our own making
I want to tell you about two Bangladeshi families from my area, because these families have something very similar to the political situation in Bangladesh. It is about two young boys from these families (neither family are related to each other). Both of the boys are currently in prison.
Boy 'A' used to make all sorts of troubles, be abusive to locals and vandalise properties. So, sometimes people would go to his parents to bring the matter to their attention, or to seek compensations. Whenever parents face a situation like this, the usual practice in our Bengali society is to apologise to the victim, promise them that you will look into the matter. And also thank them for coming to you instead of breaking your child's neck, and finally apologise to them once more. But this lucky boy had the best mother in the world. If anyone came
to her with complaints she will be very harsh on them, deny that her son is capable of ever doing such things, and a lot of people have said she would even testify that her son was in the house (one English gentleman also had a similar experience, he told me).
Boy 'B', also had a mother very similar, but he was even worse. He has been arrested many times for theft. If anyone came to his mother with complaints she will start arguing with him or her, deny everything and whenever police came she used to hide him and say she didn't see him. It is no wonder that every time this boy came out of police cell he immediately went back to his usual. Currently he is behind bars for drug abuse, theft and a number of other crimes.
In Bangladesh when the BNP does something wrong, all its supporters look the other way and keep pointing to the misdeeds of the AL. And whenever the AL does something wrong, the exact happens. It is not just the masses; intellectuals,
journalists, lawyers, teachers, press; we all are doing it. We support organisations like the AL and the BNP with money, with muscle and we fight for them, kill for them and even die for them. And now we have made them so strong and arrogant that they no longer listen to us and instead they hold us hostage to their demands. They even try to allegedly kill us if we come up with different ideas. Do you still remember the attacks on B. Choudhury and Dr Kamal Hossain by some BNP cadres few months ago?
The question now is, how do we save our lives from these monsters we ourselves have created? Is there absolutely anything we can do to bring them to justice? Personally, I don't think we can. Unlike those two boys, these parties are too powerful for our "deliberately paralysed" law to touch them. It is too late for Bangladesh. And we have only ourselves to blame for this. While they are committing crimes against our country, destroying our educational institutes, killing our economy,
insulting our country in front of the whole world and creating panic and chaos in our society with their different political fronts, we continue to support and protect them. Why? Would anyone kindly shed some light on this?
Azad Miah
Oldham, UK
Bangla band music
I'm writing this with reference to the letter 'Distortion of Bangla' by Mahfuzul Haque published in DS several days ago.
In my opinion, 'Bangla Band Music' is a very vague term. In theory, when a group of musicians get together to create music, it is called band music. However, in Bangladesh, basically any kind of music other than Rabindra Sangeet, Nazrul Geeti, classical and traditional folk songs are considered as 'band music'. The 'old' groups in general fall under the 'pop' or 'soft rock' category. The new movement can be called heavy metal, alterna-
tive rock or simply rock and metal.
In his article, Mr. Haque has tried to ridicule this movement. It is obvious that he doesn't like this genre and that's perfectly acceptable. But the way he tried to bash this genre was very irrational on his part. This was irrelevant in the argument about 'distortion of Bangla'. This just goes to show how unfairly biased his opinion towards underground metal bands is. After all, we should not waste our time arguing over the definition of good music and bad music. Nevertheless, we should have respect for all kinds of music even if we personally despise some.
I agree with what Mr. Haque said about the language Bangla. "This language certainly possesses a standard form and has a dignified history."
I agree with it hundred percent. And that's why in my opinion, Bangla is offended when we claim that some underground bands are harming the language. No band has the capability to have a negative
influence on a language with such a strong background.
Mr. Haque has not mentioned any particular band but I can guess which bands he is indicating. I can name them straight away but as he has restrained himself from doing so, I will as well. However, I confidently claim that the number of the bands with a distinct accent is very small, almost negligible.
Mr. Haque himself said that 'Band Music' did not receive the warmest of welcomes as it appeared in the Bangla music scene. But that didn't stop it from getting popular and win the heart of the audience. It is a matter of time that the current underground metal movement will be widely accepted around the country, regardless of the accent it uses. A language can have several dialects and accents. Tomorrow someone may sing in perfect Sylheti in one of these underground metal bands. Would not it be unfair to accuse them for the distortion of Bangla? Yes it would be. If we are not ashamed of different dialects of
Bangla such as Sylheti or Noakhali, we should not have issues with a Bengalish accent either. If we do, then it will be sheer hypocrisy on our part.
Asif Chowdhury
Brussels
Attitude towards RAB
Awami League is one of the largest and oldest political parties of the country. Awami League always voiced for the welfare of the people. When it was in the power, although it had good governance, but it was not successful in ensuring safety and security of the people. Law and order situation was very bad and innocent people were virtually under the captivity of the toll collectors, ransom seekers, snatchers and killers.
Almost everyday the newspapers were carrying headlines of some killings and other unlawful activities like they are doing now. Taking this weakness of the government, the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), at the time of election declared that, if
it was voted it would present a crime-free society by eradicating all criminal activities. People trusted on BNP's this election manifesto and irrespective of political affinity voted for BNP. Many die-hard Awami Leaguers also voted for BNP allegedly. In fact, people's expectation from the government is very low. People only expect to live in a peaceful environment where the law and order will be very good to protect them from unlawful activities and they will be able to move freely, carry out their business safely.
But BNP was also not able to ensure this at the initial stage. This became possible only after deployment of the elite force like RAB. RAB curbed the criminals within a short period of time and earned the confidence of the people. Now the law and order situation has significantly improved.
Khalequezzaman
Kabul, Afghanistan