DHAKA THIS WEEK

Mahbub Husain Khan

'Cry the Beloved Country' wrote Alan Paton. But that was in another country and besides the author is dead. We are now most definitely into the crying mode as a country. Shaheed Dibash, 21st February, is a mourning day. It has always been so, and now it has been crowned with the glory of being declared by UNESCO as the International Mother Language Day. 26th March is Shwadhinata Dibash, yet by that date, and on that night, and nights to follow, much blood had flowed, and every year this day is mixed with celebration and remorse. 16th December, Bijoy Dibash is Victory Day, brought about by our martyrs of 1952 and the struggle onto 1971, when there were more martyrs, and the maimed in body and in the mind. We mourn while we rejoice. We fought to establish our right to speak in our mother tongue, from 1952, and then in 1971 we defeated our colonisers, who were denying us that right. Much '...blood, toil, tears and sweat' had been experienced to establish the right to speak in our mother tongue and to emerge as an independent nation in the world community.
   Much of what we know, or think we know, about the roots of language comes from watching children learn to speak. The semantic and grammatical idiosyncrasies that distinguish one language from another, are the things that are generally learned last, after the child already has a functional command of the language. The traditional explanation is that all of this is learned at your mother's knee. Yet careful examination suggests that this is unlikely. Most adults tend to speak to infants in a simplified way, so the child may not know the difference between, say, the present tense and the past tense.
   Where vocabulary is concerned, children are very reliant on their mothers (or whoever else has the role of primary career). If she says a word, then the child generally listens and tries to repeat it. But where grammar is concerned, children go their own way. As of today, about 350 million people in the world speak English. But Bangla is not much more behind with over 220 million speaking it. So declaring 2lst February as International Mother Language day was quite appropriate as Bangla speakers are today not far behind in number than those who speak English worldwide, and other languages such as French, Spanish and German.
   
   Police and corruption
   Over days and weeks since the takeover by the new Caretaker Government, the role of the law and order agencies, including the joint forces, has assumed critical importance. In any functioning democracy using the civil bureaucracy and the law and order agencies to further political ends is a major hurdle to the continuance of a democratic society. A baseline survey on the people's perception about Bangladesh Police-carried on in the period from May to December 2006 -- has revealed that the police while performing their duties have faced obstruction by political leaders and their henchmen. The baseline survey was conducted by UNDP in eleven thanas in seven districts, where 4950 people were interviewed. The survey personnel also interviewed high police officials in the field and at the police headquarters. 78 per cent of the people interviewed said that the police took bribes from all sources and most of the time. 71 per cent said that the police were of no help when required for solution of x citizen's problems and apprehension of criminals. 41 per cent of the police admitted taking bribes from citizens and also criminals.
   A large proportion of the interviewees alleged antisocial activities of the police particularly when deployed in the villages. They felt that hoodlums, fear of transfer, political leaders or cadres, local pressure groups. Fear of being implicated in cases and pressure groups like lawyer, trade union, leader of trade union are the sources influencing the police.
   The Police Reform Programme of the UNDP, of which this survey is a part, is currently being implemented by Home Ministry and the Police Administration. "This programme intends to enhance the capacity of' Bangladesh Police and key stakeholders to contribute in a collaborative manner to the creation of a safer and more secure environment based on respect for human rights, equitable access to justice and rule of law in accordance with a multiparty democracy." Country Director of UNDP Manoj Basnyat said.
   The aspects mentioned above, elicited by the survey, show that the image of the police is at its lowest point in our country. The citizens, who are to be helped by the police for ensuring their safety and redress from minor and major crimes feel that their troubles multiply when they go to the police for help. And much of the cause contributing to such an image of the police is due to political pressures, salaries at levels not consistent with the powers and responsibilities of the police, and promotion and rewards dependent on political and also corrupt bureaucratic masters. The need of the hour is stringent and corruption-free procedures of recruitment, intensive training, and adequate salaries, other benefits and rewards Promotions must be based on seniority and merit only. Also specific targets have to be set for apprehension of criminals and decline of crime as well as performing other social roles such as controlling traffic, curbing price hike, drive against food adulteration and related issues. The present Caretaker Government has already taken many measures to punish the corrupt in our society including political leaders and their followers, and also started cleaning up the police administration. We feel that a future corruption-free police administration who will come to the succour of the people will restore the image of the police among our public and also contribute to the image of Bangladesh as a properly functioning democracy with a corruption free police and civil bureaucracy.
   In another column of mine I sought permission from the late Oscar Wilde to alter his story "The Happy Prince' to suit our times. Today I alter history, times. There was a famous personality, who was at one time, a captain in the army. Later he led a part of the army to win a war, which led to the creation of a new republic. Still later he became an influential member of the Council of State of this new republic. He witnessed the execution of one King of this republic, and deposed another corrupt king who was then imprisoned, to take on the mantle of the Lord Protector of the republic, after forcibly dissolving parliament-which totally belonged to the parties of the dead and deposed king, anyway.
   He then stayed on as Lord Protector of the Republic, on a referendum of the people, who overwhelmingly voted for him, or at least seemed to have voted for him. As Lord Protector, he started the process of reconvening parliament, with his own political party, and other political parties, who were interested in elections. An election to parliament was held, but before he could consolidate his dreams, he died. But the army and the people rallied round his system, and new elections were held.
   Of course, another Lord Protector, and later declaring himself to be a king, arose from the army, within a year or so. But that is another story, for a future column. He tried to bring about a cooperation between the army, the parliament, and the King. On the whole, he was regarded in a very limited sense as a dictator, but rather as a patriotic ruler who restored political stability after the civil unrests, and contributed to the evolution of constitutional government. In private life he was totally honest, and lived, if need arose, only on the assets of his wife's brother. By the time he died, he had transformed parliamentary politics, and the politics of the republic was never the same again after he died.
   
   Parking tangle
   I plan each day as a new life. First I plan my day's menu. Breakfast is exactly according to my diet plan for the day. After breakfast I plan the day's movement. Early in the morning, traffic is not much of a problem, and I manage to reach the offices of the newspaper. But after that it is much of a toss-up. What with all these banks in Gulshan, and the schools in Dhanmondi and offices in Motijheel and processions and meetings in front of the Press Club, you may be sure you will never be on time for any appointment after 10 am. By the time it is noon and time to return home for lunch, I get lost in the parking tangle and departing traffic of Scholastica school and college. I am surprised that this multi-storied school building has no car park. And no public agency has ever tried to enforce this. Probably because the children or grandchildren of the high and mighty study here.
   When I reach home after all this traffic turmoil, I am not sure what lunch I had planned for. So I eat anything that is on offer. Then, already tired out by the day's exertions, I take a nap. After the nap, I decide to take up my writing. I go to my study and sit in front of my PC.
   I cannot think of what to write. I tap out the word "The"; this I think is as safe a start as may be, and might possibly break my 'writer's block.' But nothing else comes to me, so I go downstairs and go up to the club. At the club I pass a cheerful hour or so. And another hour. Then, 1 beg apology of this cheerful crowd and say that I have to go back home to write for my living.
   But the cheerful crowd is not ready to let me go, and says that a great writer like me will only take a few minutes to finish my column. Another hour passes and then another. Finally much cheered by the crowd and liquid refreshments on offer, I finally make it home. At home I sit before the PC. The small, bleak "The" is looking at me out of the expanse of the PC screen. I stare at it for several minutes. Then a sudden idea comes to me. I finish the sentence, which reads "The hell with it." I shut down my PC, skip dinner and go to bed. And to hell with my plans for each day, whatever Seneca the younger may have said or not.
   In the beginning there was the public sector and the private sector. The public sector was the government and the public agencies. They had underpaid officials with lots of power. Some of these underpaid officials translated that power to surplus value in terms of money. The private sector made money in business, and industry. It paid its executives well, and some of this money earned in business, by fair means or foul, went to some officials who dispensed favours.
   And then the Donors created the NGO. They were neither public nor private sector. They were for the social enhancement of our people, basically in the rural areas. They were supposed to reach the parts that public or private sectors did not reach and undertake projects that the monolithic government did not spend enough money or energy on, and which were considered not worth the money to be spent on by the private sector.
   So the NGOs taught some arts and crafts to the village women and others interested in profiting by such training, and brought the products to selling centres in the towns and cities. But very soon they were into loans and banking, with interest rates and mortgage rules much more stiff than the greedy merchants who are into private banking or the rules-bound nationalised banks. Then came industrial ventures by the NGOs.
   Imagine this scenario. A few of your close friends are gathered round the dinner table to start a meal cooked by Yours Truly. One of the guests puts a morsel of Koi fish sauteed in extra virgin olice oil with fresh plum tomatoes into his mouth. Suddenly, and naturally enough without any warning, the light goes off. He swallows the fish in total darkness, and a bone lodges itself in his throat. Pandemonium! Fish bones of koi have caused death and disability before. We rush to the nearest clinic with our friend and there is no electricity in the clinic also. After looking into a few clinics nearby with the same result, we have to drive him down to the P.G. Hospital emergency ward. At least there are emergency stand-by generators there. Anyway the tale has a happy ending. The bone gets plucked out by the doctor and the friend's throat is soothed and the danger of asphyxiation is past.
   This is no imagined scenario. This is what happened at a dinner last week at my house at Uttara, and I had to drive my friend from clinic to clinic and ultimately to the PG. Hospital. There are many tales of similar ilk now current in this fair town of ours. And the cause is only one. Not enough power available to meet peak loads. When I first came to live in Uttara, nearly ten years back, I was smirkingly assuring my friends, particularly, those living in Dhanmondi, that there was no load-shedding in my part of town. But since then, things have changed. In Uttra, the power is switched off for over an hour, once at daytime, and once in the evening. What is irritating to me all of us metro-dwellers is that the powers that be in the power sector, while quick to quote exact figures of the power deficit at any given minute is superbly unconcerned and ignorant about where and when the deficit will require 'load' to be 'shedded'.
   Now that the present government has started by rationing of electricity of stores, from next Sunday, they should be able to stop the totally unnecessary and ostentatious use of electricity on such occasions as illumination at wedding ceremonies. The administration has been imposing guest control ordinances in times of food shortages. Why cannot the same administration impose power control ordinances in these days of the power crisis. The luxuries of total air conditioning should be sacrificed for the more urgent needs of domestic lighting and industrial power. As the swelteringly hot months of the year approach, it may well be that power will be off for twelve hours a day. Which will make things much easier for us. At least we will know that we will be without power either in the daytime or night time, and programme our activities accordingly. We might get more efficient that way. What we had accomplished in an average eighteen hour waking day, we would be able to do in twelve hours.
   On top of this paying in the bills in our 'load-shedded' territory has also become very difficult. As self assesses we used to get a bill-book which lasted twelve months or so. But now we are being given only two sheets so that we have to visit the electricity office every two months exposing us to minor corruption and major harassment. It seems we cannot get electricity and riot even pay for what we do not get.

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