GOOD and a right move, although belated. The proposals made are certainly in the right direction, but to me it looks too utopian. Putting the burden of selecting honest and deserving candidates, in the present day context of confusion and disillusionment in the entire society, may turn out to be a tall order. On the other hand the entire proposal lacks details, besides any proposal to be workable should also have dealt with the longstanding flaws prevalent in the two major parties in the coming elections. In political terms one also has to remember that selecting and putting up honest and proficient

people alone will not ensure a reversal of the process. It is particularly difficult when you come to consider the decades of corrupt culture in the entire process of elections. Tagging the present day problems facing the country about accountable and credible process of national elections merely to selection of “ right" candidates is perhaps oversimplifying the entire issue.

Creating a social movement as I have hinted above is bound to be a long drawn and difficult process taking the civil society into confidence particularly in its present state. There is no denying the fact that today much of our civil society stands divided; the

intellectuals, the various groups of professionals too are somehow tagged to one of the two major political parties.

At the backdrop of the above it is my conviction that the stress should be more in hitting out at the Administrative machinery as a whole, the office of the election commission etc, all agencies who are directly involved in the election process in an effort to making them more accountable. We should target our efforts to streamline the present system not just for this forthcoming election alone but also aim at creating a viable legacy for the future ones too. With malice towards none and charity for all let me also say this:

many of the key participants of the dialogue are not above suspicion in as far their alleged affiliation to one of the two major political parties are concerned and hence the members of the civil society they are addressing may hesitate to respond one way or the other.

The problem with us is that we have too many politicians but few patriots.

Shamsher Chowdhur is a freelance writer.