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To the Editor...
Letters will only be considered If they carry the writer s full name, address and telephone number (If any). The Identity of the writers will be protected. Letters must be limited to 300 words. All letters will be subject to editing.
Discouraging youthful talent
A front page report published in a local English daily on July 21 was simply unbelievable! How can we consider more age as a qualifying criterion and lower age in passing SSC examination as a disqualifying criterion for admission; where college seats are scarce, particularly in good and established colleges? This is a sad reflection where age is preferred when scholastic performance is identical! It is one of the absurd decisions that we have in Bangladesh governance and the military backed CTG is no better.
In fact, this decision is the worst ever taken in the education sector, one can imagine for whose benefit!
It reflects the short-sighted attitude that discourages the young and talented students.
/\!1 things being equal, the younger the applicant, the more preference he or she should get for being admitted. If SSC marks are identical, then the school history should be the logical selection criterion. For example, how many years has the applicant taken to cover classVI to classX. Naturally, it should be five years. Anyone taking more than that should automatically get lower marking for admission.
Do we imply that given the same SSC marking, someone doing it at, say, 25 years ofage is preferred over someone who did it at fifteen?
If that be so. then by the time the person finishes Master's examination he or she will be aged at least thirty-one years, if not more, given our usual delays and session jams!
How sad and sorry a state of affairs it is for the talented youngsters, receiving unfair treatment and getting discouraged for finishing SSC at a younger age! It should be the other way around; encouraging them to do better and earlier. Nothing could be worse than this.
We are becoming a quixotic nation that prefers mediocrity to talent and youthful intelligence!
We are opening the path to incompetence; wasting national educational resources. Meanwhile,
all our bigwigs in the government desire capable and talented persons to lead the nation. What an example of absurd and transparent double standards!
SA. Mansoor
Gulshan
Dhaka
Nuclear energy and Bangladesh
With the looming energy crisis, the importance of utilising nuclear energy as a possible replacement of depleting bio fuels is quite evident. Nuclear energy is being harnessed
Waste management ihe disposal of domestic rubbish at certain places selected by the DCC becomes a vital task to get rid of an unhygienic ambiance. In every civilised country, people dump these materials into dustbins in a safe manner. What is most appalling in our country is the lack of our spontaneity to handle the garbage materials properly. In most of the cases, people throw away the waste materials anywhere! Horribly enough. I have seen people throwing domestic S garbage from high-rise buildings on pedestrians' heads!
A fruitful solution to the problem can't be found only by transferring all the responsibilities to the authorities concerned. Citizens have to cooperate with them! Sarwar Hussain
Dept, of Computer Science and Eng.
University of Chittagong
Working forthepoor
Ref Zafar Sobhan's "Deep in the heart of nowhere" which appeared in your issue of July 25. It appears that Zafar Sobhan has been misinformed that Friendship is ”£he only organisation, governmental or other, that works together with the people of the islands to make their fives safer and more secure."
I would like to set the record straight. Chars Livelihoods Programme (CLP), a programme sponsored by the Rural Development & Cooperatives Division of Ministry of Local Government, Rural Development and Cooperatives and funded by the UK's Department for y International Development has been working in 5 districts of the Jamuna River Basin since2004.
Working through local government at Upazila and Union Parishad level and through over 20 NGOs, including Friendship, by the end of the programme in 2010, CLP's assistance will have raised homestead plinths for 100,000 families above the highest known flood level and provided assets, usually cattle, to 55,000 of the poorest families.
Training on cattle rearing and homestead gardening is also given to the beneficiaries who attend weekly social development group meetings at which they learn many subjects which assist them to five a safer and healthier life. Primary schooling and community based health care is also provided in the island chars.
It is also worth pointing out that, in addition to its normal development programme, during the floods of 2007, CLP, through its NGO partners, provided two _ rounds of relief supplies to 125,000
families in the flood affected chars.
Md. Am Inui Haque i
Programme Director (in-charge) Chars Livelihoods
ICMA admission
The Institute of Cost & Management Accountants of Bangladesh (popularly known as ICMA) has been playing an important role in the fields of accounting, finance, management and business in our country. This institute produces every year a good number of professionals who later contribute to their respective fields. Minimum requirement for entering this course is a bachelor's degree which should be changed, I think
In our country Chartered Accountancy (CA) is another popular and honourable professional degree in which brilliant A-level and HSC (GPA-5 both in SSC & HSC) passed students can get admission.
An A-level passed student can also enrol in the world famous British ACCA (The Association of Chartered Certified Accountants) course. Besides, as far as I can remember the entry requirement of CMA was HSC in the initial period. In the past it needed two or three years which needs three or four years now for degree (pass) and bachelor's degree holders (with honours) respectively. After graduation a student has to look for a job or a bride/ bridegroom. So it is hardly possible to think about CMA then. But we need a huge number of professional accountants.
So, HSC/ A-level should be the minimum entry requirement for CMA It will save time, money and energy of the students. An elementary course of six months can be introduced for HSC/ A-level passed students.
Harun-or-Rashid
Sobhanbag Dhaka
Car owners' predicament
Recently, I went for my car fitness certificate renewal (previously done by others). While the present government is trying to simplify the service sector, the BRTC is unreasonably complicating the process. First. I filled up three pages of BRTC deposit book of Tk445 (45 for label sticker) for depositing to local Gulshan PO After about half an hour in queue, I deposited Tk.445 and the man at the counter wrote another set of receipts and returned one copy of this receipt ♦ 2 copies of BRTC book. Then I went to the BRTC office in Mirpur at about 11 30am, again after half an hour they gave
an application form (why?) to fill in and told me to give the photocop- • ies of current tax token and the previous year's chalan deposit (both are already in their file) + TIN certificate. (I had). Finally, the car was inspected in 5 minutes and I got the certificate without a sticker label (but a rubber stamping- no label was issued though Tk 45 had been deposited) at about 2-30pm i.e. after 3 hours.
Surely, the process can be simplified and duplication of receipts and photocopies etc. avoided. If any necessary paper is needed like TIN certificate it should be displayed in P.O. so that one can take them without waiting to be told by the BRTC staff.
K. Ahmed
On e-mail
BCS
The HC rejected the writ petition filed by a few successful candidates challenging the decision taken by the government to cancel the final result of the 27th BCS exams. The new results will be published soon.
We know there are vacant posts in the cadre services. I acknowledge a few candidates took the path of corruption but for that reason the majority cannot be punished!
Mohammad Masum Miah Department of Sociology Dhaka University
Gas prices
The Daily Star reported recently that The Petrobangla had made a proposal to Bangladesh Energy Regulatory Commission (BERC) for enhancing the fuel gas price. From the report, it has been revealed that nine widely varying rates have been in force for different groups of consumers buying the same gas.
The constitution of Bangladesh upholds the principle that every citizen is equal in the eye of law. So, the BERC authorities should look into the matter.
Md. Ashraf Hossain
Central Bashabo
Dhaka
Three problems
Global warming, political instability and inflation are three main problems plaguing the world nowadays. Global warming leads to natural disasters.
Political instability causes economic backwardness.
Inflation is the most serious problem all over the world. This is a challenge that we have to face successfully to survive.
Bakul Chandra Kabira]
University of Dhaka
in more than 30 countries to produce electricity and this figure is projected to escalate substantially in the years to come, especially in Asia. According to World Nuclear Association (WNA), Asia alone may be producing one third of the total electricity generated using nuclear power by the year 2020. Though a mammoth task, the idea of setting up a nuclear power plant on our very soil for the sole purpose of tbeing in compliance ■with^ow. burgeoning energy demand is by no means a utopian scheme.
Previous governments though had expressed their intention in this regard, hands on initiatives are yet to come. As Bangladesh has already received IAEA's approval to establish a nuclear power plant, it's time that we make expeditious efforts on a time-frame basis towards materialising this prolific source of energy. The cost and efforts involved are to be gigantic, but it would for sure not surpass the brunt we might have to bear in case we end up being a country which relies on the energy produced by others.
Zunaid
Banani, Dhaka
Count Tolstoy's immortal story “ How much land does a man need" is a widely read short story by Count Leo Tolstoy, who is adjudged by the literary critique of the world as the greatest novelist of all times. One should therefore be more careful in using similes with such a story and the characters portrayed therein to emphasize the greediness and the corrupt activities of the politicians of our country.
The story by Tolstoy is about a man named ’Pahom" and his discontentment about what he had in his possession and his greediness to expand his property by acquiring more and more land. Finally. in the quest of expanding his landed property to the maximum he accepted the conditions set forth by the Chieftain of a tribe known as Bashkirs, to become the master of that much of land as he could go around on his feet in a day in exchange of 1000 rubles only. Pahom accepted the conditions and gained vast tract of land but in the end fell short of his breath and succumbed to death because of exhaustion . The story’ reached its climax when the servant of Pahom dug a grave long enough for Pahom to lie in and buried him in it.
Narration of the conditional generosity offered by a rich man to a poor friend of his as done by Mr. Shafiqul Islam in his letter to you published on last Sunday is just concoction and can very well be described as a figment of his imagination. That said. I cannot but wholly agree with what he has said about the BNP stalwarts. After going through the story, 1 was groping for the guilt we. as a nation, might haw committed in the past to have such a family in power! Rczaul Karim
Banani DOHS. Dhaka
BSF atrocities
If you are a regular reader of The Daily Star and have access to the
Internet, why not do some cyber research? Asking on what? Why not linguistic research? It's fun, I guarantee. Just go to DS home page (http://www.thedaiJystar.net) and write “BSF kills" in the space provided for search. You will be amazed at the harvest of human crops reaped by BSF at regular intervals. Please do it just to understand how cheap, easy and fun shedding Bangladeshi blood is. Not O1 many„.in(g.lle<4uals anijnedia^ people in Bangladesh are interested in writing on this harvest of blood. But that's quite alright. Not everyone's blood is equally important to everyone.
Obaid, Brisbane
Attention: law enforcers
I was so scared that I did not even bother to go to the law enforcing agencies. It would have been even dangerous for me and for my kids. But I could not tolerate it anymore.
I thought that writing to you might help me a bit.
I live in Taltola, Khilgaon. I am living here for nearly 17 years. In recent years, crimes have increased dramatically. Young people take drugs and at night they get involved in various sorts of crimes. It was several years ago that one day I tried to protest when some young boys were teasing some girls of the area I protested several times. These boys were all in their mid twenties. 1 think it was the biggest mistake of my life. They not only’ threatened me but even laid their hands on my servant one day. They told me that I should not speak about this to anyone and let the things go on. They even told me that they are the workers of the local Member of Parliament who happened to be also the adviser to the chairperson of a leading political party.
I cannot live in fear anymore. Hope we will get justice.
S.Ahmed
Khilgaon. Dhaka
Teachers' demand
Some of our colleagues are sitting in front of the administrative building of Shah Jalal University for more than two weeks. They have demanded 'Upgrading' of service. All of them have achieved their Ph.D. and other required degrees. About one year ago they were eligible for promotion. But the authorities are delaying the process. It's disgraceful for the teachers that the upcoming professors are sitting on the ground.
Please take necessary action without further delay.
Md. ?\bdul I lamid On e-mail
Drive against corruption Corruption in the two major political parties is known to all and supporting it in some way or the other is to be condemned by all. Those not happy with the action being taken against the corrupt elements should see the DS report "Shamim rode on Biman”.
Abdul Gaffer Chowdhury One-mat I